Originally posted November 5, 2010...
Hello Friends.
I wore a suit yesterday and nobody died or got married. Well, I’m sure some people did, but my wearing a suit was incidental in those occasions. I only wear a suit for weddings or funerals, you see, except for yesterday. Come to think of it, wouldn’t it be cool if I did own a suit wherein, when I donned it, nobody could die or get married? What awesome power! People would call me from all over the world, pleading. “Oh please, Mister James, I only want one more day with my grandfather, por favor! Wear the suit!” I don’t know why the person pleading with me is of Spanish descent, but there you go. Or I’d get messages from bro’s jumping into marriage too quickly. “Dude, could you wear the suit this weekend? My fiance’s turned into a bitch.” Anyway, I digress.
The reason I wore the suit was to attend a meeting and I wanted to look sharp. I had it dry-cleaned for the occasion and put on my too small black shoes and my tie and combed my hair with a salad fork and just… didn’t look right. Maybe it’s because I don’t wear suits often, but I think I look like my five year old self trying on my father’s clothes for dress-up. My confidence grew, though, as I got on the crowded subway that morning and saw other men in dress like men. Confident men. Successful men. Businessmen.
Dream: To be a businessman.
Goal: Achievable. I have friends my age who are businessmen. They wear suits with confidence, throw dinner parties and have monogrammed towels. Actually, if I were a businessman, I probably wouldn’t have monogrammed towels because my initials are J.O. and people would see them in my bathroom and think, “These are jack-off towels!”
Plan: I don’t have a head for business (or a bod for sin), so I’m not sure the long years of higher education in the business and administration field would be to my benefit. Instead, I think if I act as if I am a businessman well enough, eventually I will just become one somehow.
First, I have to look good in a suit. Nothing looks better than a man in a tailored suit. Except maybe spinach dip in a tailored bread bowl–that looks pretty good. Anyway, I admire a man who can pull off a suit (if only admiration could pull the suit off a man, am I right ladies?) I think the key elements are tailoring, colour, and lack of sweat stains. I sweat through any suit, so I’d have to find one really breathable. Maybe they could start making suits wear the shirt is actually sewn into the jacket (instead of wearing a jacket over the shirt–it’s a fake out!). But then how would you squeeze through the neck hole when putting it over your head? Elastic collars? I don’t know, I’m spit-balling here.
If that fails, and it most certainly will, I just have to master modern technology. Businessman have iPhones and iPads and Blackberries. I have a lanline, notepad and blueberry coolers. Not the same. I borrowed Jon’s cell for the week to take to my meeting and even though it’s a few years old and just a phone (nothing fancy, no mp3′s, no touch screen, no internet access) it’s absolutely confounding to me. Like how can something so small and delicate allow me to hear from it’s tiny earpiece and still pick up what I’m saying? My face is a mile long and that phone is four inches. I keep moving it from my ear to my mouth like it’s an ancient walky-talkie and I’m in an underwater cave. “MEET YOU IN FRONT! IN THE FRONT! MEET YOU THERE! THERE!” I yell into the phone, I just don’t trust it to hear me otherwise.
Lastly, being a businessman is surely mainly about confidence. It takes confidence to wear a suit, command attention and be successful. While I don’t lack confidence, I certainly don’t have the balls to scream, “These projections are totally inaccurate!” into an iPhone while stuck in my Jag on the DVP en route to my condo. Best I can do is scream, “I’LL MEET YOU IN FRONT OF THE MUSEUM IN AN HOUR! IN AN HOUR!!! MUSEUM!” and hurry to the subway to meet a dear friend, to giggle and catch up, in my sweat-stained suit, and go about my business.
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