What are you wearing?
Our angst-of-the-weekend is how to parse the words “cocktail attire”, a requirement embedded in a rare, exceedingly rare, invitation to a wedding tomorrow.
I guess this exposes the paucity of our social life. The only times since 2000 that I have worn other than jeans or cargo shorts outside the house have been Rainbow City Band concerts and parades. Yes, the tuxedo is a pretty high bar of dressiness, but it was totally a uniform, and not representative of our social status.
Subsequent to early-on marital bargaining, “cocktail attire” around the house at minimum requires underwear, and this stricture is almost universally observed.
The search for how to satisfy the emergent requirement sent me first to, of course, Google, which apprised me that it entailed:
He should wear:
A suit and tie. Lean toward darker hues in chillier months, and feel free to opt for lighter grays or blues in warmer weather.
She should wear:
A cocktail dress or dressy suit or jumpsuit.
Speaking only my side of the closet, there are easily 40+ years of garments hanging there, many of which think Reagan is still president. There are suits hanging there that I wore in the late 90s for work, and perhaps a few from the 80s that my mother, an excellent seamstress, made for me, also for work. The Smithsonian would make my side of the closet an exhibit, perhaps a feature in the magazine.
So, on the surface, it seemed that I might be able to comply with Miss Google’s requirement. However, this broached a topic that was not merely sartorial: the corollary requirement that the garments, regardless of current style considerations, could actually be donned, zipped and buttoned some 20 years later.
So I began to wonder if the requirement somehow might not be as east-coast, Men’s-Wearhouse-restrictive, and I consulted some of my few acquaintances that might not be as socially clueless as I am. And “suit-and-tie” gave way to options that might incorporate some of my more recent relaxed-fit options: khakis, open-collar dress shirt, and a sport coat that I bought at Nordstrom many years ago and have never worn, but won’t actually have to be buttoned in extremis.
And Voila! I have a combination that, as long as I restrict my visits to the hors d’oeuvre tray, might get me through the evening. Keep your eye on the fashion pages, and beware of buttons ricocheting off the walls and chandeliers.
The word from Mrs. Perils’ side of the closet is that any such angst was totally on my side, and she has a lovely option to don. Lucky for me - all eyes will be on her, and I will slink gratefully in her penumbra.
This should be required reading! I never know what to wear and I probably don’t care enough to find out. I think I’m dressed up when my t-shirt doesn’t have words on it.
Prolly the last time I’ll have to deal with it, Su. Yeah, my “message” T-shirts are in my dresser drawer, and my non-message T-shirts are hanging in the closet, just so I don’t get confused.
When I worked at Microsoft each division had its own Christ^H^H^H^H^H^HHoliday party. The admins for our division wrote up the invitation, which included the sentence “Dress code: semi-formal”. This was cause for much confusion. What constituted semi-formal. Questions flew up and down the chain of command (engineers to admins) until finally a determination was made by Someone, probably Steve Ballmer, that the definition of semi-formal was a clean pair of chinos and a clean shirt with a collar.
Great story, Molly! I actually own a tux, which I bought 10 years ago for our band concerts, but that would not have qualified. So out of the social loop. Perhaps the hint is, if I’m invited to something, they actually mean for me to demur on the event, but still check the gift registry.
Hope you’re doing well, and surviving the smoke and heat.