Inside the belt way
Jun. 18th, 2008 05:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
penfield"If you're robbing a bank and you're pants fall down, I think it's okay to laugh and to let the hostages laugh too, because, come on, life is funny."
- Jack Handey, "Deep Thoughts"
Revisiting a notion from Monday's journal entry: on belts as utilities or accessories.
As I said: belts straddle a fine line; if they are modest, spartan, tasked only with upholding pants, it is fine. But once you start adding colors, weaves, conspicuously gaudy buckles, etc., the belt crosses over to mere decoration.
I was dressing myself for work today in a pair of pants that fit me particularly well. (This is not always easy. I was bequeathed a set of remarkably bulky thighs, real beef rounds, which make loose-fitting, comfortable pants difficult to buy, especially if you want to avoid excessive pleating, which I do. These well-tailored flat-front pants are roomy enough in the thigh without leaving me swimming in waistline, all while framing my buttocks quite favorably, if I may be so boastful.)
Once dressed, I put on my shoes and I realized something was missing -- a belt. I just looked funny without a belt. It was as if that one inch of fabric at the top of the waistline was enough to make me look like I'm in the tenth shuffleboard frame at Del Boca Vista. (In the past I have been able to go beltless with jeans and shorts, but anything more formal than pajama bottoms seem to require a border.)
So I opted for a belt as a line of demarcation between my upper and lower body. It was a simple, understated belt, dark brown leather with a spare gold buckle, which would seem to disqualify it as a mere bauble. However, it is no more keeping my pants up than is willpower, which strips it of any practical value. I suppose it falls into that vague catch-all category of "accessory," which is semantically accurate but semiotically boring.
It also bothers me because I feel like I am succumbing to conventional, superficial pressure, like the era in high school when I tight-rolled my jeans. I'm proud of the fact that I was one of the first Webster High School students to stop doing so, though I fear I'm too belt-assimilated to stop this current trend.
There's good news, though: if I don't stop eating the free-for-all leftover cookies in the kitchen, the belt is not only going to serve as a powerful brace against button damage, it may have value as an structural engineering experiment.
- Jack Handey, "Deep Thoughts"
Revisiting a notion from Monday's journal entry: on belts as utilities or accessories.
As I said: belts straddle a fine line; if they are modest, spartan, tasked only with upholding pants, it is fine. But once you start adding colors, weaves, conspicuously gaudy buckles, etc., the belt crosses over to mere decoration.
I was dressing myself for work today in a pair of pants that fit me particularly well. (This is not always easy. I was bequeathed a set of remarkably bulky thighs, real beef rounds, which make loose-fitting, comfortable pants difficult to buy, especially if you want to avoid excessive pleating, which I do. These well-tailored flat-front pants are roomy enough in the thigh without leaving me swimming in waistline, all while framing my buttocks quite favorably, if I may be so boastful.)
Once dressed, I put on my shoes and I realized something was missing -- a belt. I just looked funny without a belt. It was as if that one inch of fabric at the top of the waistline was enough to make me look like I'm in the tenth shuffleboard frame at Del Boca Vista. (In the past I have been able to go beltless with jeans and shorts, but anything more formal than pajama bottoms seem to require a border.)
So I opted for a belt as a line of demarcation between my upper and lower body. It was a simple, understated belt, dark brown leather with a spare gold buckle, which would seem to disqualify it as a mere bauble. However, it is no more keeping my pants up than is willpower, which strips it of any practical value. I suppose it falls into that vague catch-all category of "accessory," which is semantically accurate but semiotically boring.
It also bothers me because I feel like I am succumbing to conventional, superficial pressure, like the era in high school when I tight-rolled my jeans. I'm proud of the fact that I was one of the first Webster High School students to stop doing so, though I fear I'm too belt-assimilated to stop this current trend.
There's good news, though: if I don't stop eating the free-for-all leftover cookies in the kitchen, the belt is not only going to serve as a powerful brace against button damage, it may have value as an structural engineering experiment.
