20160609 (style)

Close, but this guy is too hunky

“It’s hard to look stylish in 

Diabetic shoes.” Great title 

For a memoir—might be yet.

Since my endocrinologist gave

Me a two-page, single-spaced

Paper on the importance of  

Wearing diabetic shoes (which 

I’ve yet to read) I’ve worn them

Exclusively except for the  

Recent wedding. They are so

Counter to my style as I see it 

(Which both first and second

Wives agreed I had little). A 

Charge I reject wholeheartedly, 

Despite numerous observers 

Coming up to me at church

With wiseass comments like,

“I see Jean/Dinah dressed you 

This morning,” and more often 

Than not being right. In eighth

Grade there was that pair of 

Black dress trousers with the

Thin pink strip on each outer 

Seam that I can’t blame on 

Anyone else. Likewise the

Marine-short haircuts I’d get in

High school and college in

Rebellion to grandmothers

Smelling of flowers and 

Powdered chubby aunts who 

Patted my my normally-parted

Hair into a spikey mess though

It had been slicked into submission

With a teaspoon of Vitalis and

Ten minutes combing at the 

Bathroom sink. For most of my

Elementary days at St. Mary’s

(As it was so economically known

Rather than the mouthful of Our

Lady of Czestochowa Parish 

School—can you blame them?)

Mama put me in corduroy. Jeans

Were for the public school pagans. 

I went likewise to a high school

That forbade jeans. We wore

Shirts and ties. I remember 

Pushing the envelope one day

With a green plaid shirt, a 

Bright red tie, yellow suspenders,

Industrial brown pants, and 

A pair  of Hush Puppies (Tennis

Shoes outside gym were verboten!).

Had I realized I was blazing the

Trail for a generation of Urkels I

Might have thought twice. It was

High school where I decorated my

Head with bright aluminum temples

To upgrade my Coke-bottle-bottom

Horn rims. A friend introduced me

To “Ivy League.” His parents’

Vision extended beyond ethnic

Cleveland enclaves. My second

Generation Polish Mama still 

Made all my choices. College

Found me more given to a monkish

Future. I stuck with black pants,

White shirts, and gray sweaters— 

No ties required, except for ROTC.

For two mandatory years. There

Was no talk of Catholics being

Pacifists like Dorothy Day or 

Thomas Merton. My antiwar

Sentiments had yet to develop.

Resistance? Out of the question.

That was for those godless kids at

Kent. We, good parochially-trained

Were obedient, chapel-attending,

And repressed. And they liked it 

That way. Whether we had learned

To self-stultify after twelve years 

Or whether we had internalized

“Big Father is watching you,” the 

Results of stepping on free thoughts

Made us shabby intellectuals and

We (I, at least) looked the part.

c. J.S.Manista, 2016