Clothes DO make the man
PAUL KARRER
“Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.”
— Mark Twain
I’ve called it a different face for a different place. When I taught my fifth-graders, I couldn’t swear and didn’t. Normally, that’s a thing I very much like to do around the house, much to my wife’s despair, although she has taught me a few prized Korean words.
At home I dress casually, jeans, denim shirt, crocs in the house. If I need to get something done with people on the other side of a counter, I dress up a bit. It really does matter what one wears – impressions are made and acted upon, like it or not.
For example, when I walk in the hood and I see a person wearing black pants and a white shirt, I do an assessment. If the shirt has a collar and there are two people wearing black pants, white collared shirts and each has a name tag. It’s s fair bet they’re Mormons. If the black pants are hanging at knee, a baseball hat akimbo on the cabeza, and the person wearing them is doing an exaggerated leg dragging skip hop as he or she ambles along I can assume they are not identifying as Mormons. Quick assessments like that are necessary, can make a life-or-death difference at times, but often are wrong.
Sometimes I have to fix or repair things in the yard. My wife would disagree and use the descriptive verbs: tarnish, despoil, mess up, ruin, and finally break. Not fix.
Anyhoooo, during those times I call my attire “dirt-bagging it.” My jeans are ripped, knobby knees show. Dried paint stains cover my pants. My work shirt resembles a Jackson Pollock mural, elbows have holes, the collar is frayed. Both are dirty, particularly if the job requires me to be on my knees like if I’m replacing fence posts.
I fight the sun with a beaten, faded baseball hat. Paint and dirt tattoo that as well. My loyal dog watches me do this. She is deaf, going blind. But she’s a bit smarter than me and sits in the shade.
At some point, I need a break and the dog wants a walk. So I kill two birds with one stone. We walk to 7-Eleven. I plan to get a Big Gulp and a hotdog for $1.99. I tie the dog outside the store. A lady wants to go in the same time I do. I hold the door for her.
She says, “That’s a very nice thing to do.”
I reply, “Pretty easy to do.”
She walks through, smiles and adds, “Not everyone does it.”
I smile, “They should.”
I go to the counter and order my Big Gulp and hot dog. Then move to the condiment section and wait. The lady buys whatever and goes out the door. She says something to my dog.
Eventually, I get my order. When I want to pay the man behind the counter points outside, “Lady paid for you.”
“Huh?” I say. I see her getting into her car, she waves. I acknowledge her, give her a thumbs up and wave back. Puts a shine on my day.
Later when my wife comes home I tell her what happened.
“Some people are just good,” I say.
She shakes her wise head at me and laughs, “Come here.”
“Why? Where?”
She walks me to a full-length mirror in the hallway. She pulls the dog over, too. The dog lays at my feet. “What?” I say. The dog would, too, if she could.
“Look at you two!”
I look. I’m dirty from head to toe. Shot clothes. Dog is uglier than sin and has cataracts.
My wife continues, “She thought you two were homeless. She thought she was doing a good deed. Homeless and … hopeless. Did you finish the fence?”
“Maybe tomorrow.”
Next time I’ll take my hat off and leave it by the dog. Might get a couple bucks for the lottery.