New Clothes!

So, my girlfriend and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary on Monday, and being the workaholics that we (she) are, we decided to grab takeout pad thai and do our homework on our ACTUAL anniversary. However, every time we went to the local Borders we smelled the delicious steakhouse behind it, and if there's anything yours truly can't refuse, it's eight ounces of filet mignon in bearnaise sauce. So we decided to investigate. However, at about 4:30 this morning I realized that while I had semi-nice pants that sorta kinda fit me, a nice, basic white Oxford from Ralph Lauren Rugby's men's section, and my dashing red skulls tie from the same, I had nothing to put on my feet except sneakers and too-large wingtips.

So I hightailed it out to my local Macy's and because I got lucky they were having a sale. By the time I had descended the staircase into the men's section, however, I was sweating bullets. I don't know why, but I just have this idea in my head of the men's section of any store being a bastion similar to the men's room, in which at any moment I was liable to be accosted and told that not only did I not belong here, I was going to be forcibly ejected any minute and was not expected to return-- only in much uglier terms.

Instead I found a graveyard of bored guys and their girlfriends/wives cruising the racks, taking for dull-eyed granted what I saw as a cornucopia of magnificence: styles, cuts, colors and fabrics that I would not be even allowed to look at were I to go shopping with my mother. Here were the clothes that I'd been coveting for so many years, all laid out on racks before me, free for me to...buy. Anyhoo. I scooted down to the shoes section and quickly got lost, starry-eyed, in the kind of shoes I'd only been dreaming of for years. I of course wanted to buy everything in every color imaginable, but I made myself focus. I was here to get brown Oxfords, preferably wingtips, to go with my brown belt, and I wanted to get them as cheaply but as fashionably as possible.

I soon found myself choosing between two lower end brands, one pair at $40 and the other at $60. The $40-dollar ones were acceptable, but at the same time I could tell why they were $40. Plus I knew that I would look like a twelve year old boy dressed by his mother and forced to go to church, a far cry from the suave, debonair butch that I wanted to be. So I gritted my teeth and grabbed the $60 pair, brown Alfani Oxfords, and started looking for a sales rep to get me sizes. This proved a little tricky but I was lucky enough to get a wonderfully flamboyantly gay man to help me out, and he even aided me in picking out dress socks (though I had to tone down his taste a little bit- I'm not quite ready for crazy colors). Then, pleased with myself, I headed to the checkout counter- and stopped.

They were having a sale on Dockers dress-casual pants, and as I stared at them with what I'm sure was a lustful, longing look that one often sees on nerds confronted with hot girls, I thought about the pants I had at home. They were...all right. A little tight around the waist, a little bit short as a result, and not particularly dressy. Dammit, I was taking a classy girl out tonight (trust me, if you knew my girlfriend you'd know she is undyingly classy) and I was NOT doing it in American Eagle relaxed fit casual chinos! Grabbing a pair of flat-front Dockers (I just don't really like pleats), I headed to the dressing room.

Annnnnd...dilemma number two. This was the men's section. The dressing room was, typically, reserved for men (though it didn't say that, it was pretty well assumed). After a moment of quandary, I headed upstairs. I had already done enough nervewracking gender trespassing today and I figured I'd done my part towards the dissolution of gender regulation; it was my turn to trend for safety. Of course, I'd have to get past the guard dogs of the women's room, but at least my voice and the gender cues (flippy wrists, hip swing) that I turn on specifically for places like dressing rooms and public bathrooms would protect me there.

Looking in the mirror, I had that experience again. You, if you are any kind of genderqueer or alternatively gendered creature, know the one- and even if you don't, you probably do too: looking in the mirror and finally, FINALLY liking what I saw. I've gotten that more and more since I've embraced my other-genderedness, but it's still a relatively new experience. Which makes me mad, and makes me wont to talk about the tyranny of regulated, regulation gender, but that's a whole nother post (or bunch of them).

Anyway, I got out of the dressing room with no comment, and paid for my stuff. Best part about all of this: Dockers pants, Alfani Oxfords, and (splurge!) Calvin Klein dress socks: $90. Score at Macy's! Unfortunately, the gf had a lot of homework last night and got about two hours of sleep, so when she begged off from our evening out I was inclined to be merciful. Tomorrow night, however, is a different story. I'm going to see what I can do about posting pictures, but I look pretty damn debonair, if I do say so myself. The only thing I'm worried about is the proverbial bathroom problem, scourge of genderqueers and transfolks all over the world. But that's a different story; milady must go to bed early tonight and it is up to me to enforce that. So for tonight, adieu...but for tomorrow, more posts!