Plaid Shirts and the Stories They Tell

         It is the small things, like a plaid shirt – hanging unworn, un-ironed in a chifferobe – that let you know what sort of a person a person is. It is, however, not the books on a person's bookshelf that let you know what sort of a person a person is. It is rather the books they have read, for I think many people do not read the books they own, or perhaps have read a great deal many more than they own. A plaid shirt though, is profound.

         There are of course, many stories that a person's plaid shirt may tell. For instance, a plaid shirt may be worn by a farmer, conforming to that stereotype. Or perhaps by a man on his day off, indicating some sort of fraternity with the farmer – his desire to appear as though his socio-economic status is not the determinant of the clothes he wears. Even a woman, attempting to oppose some socially constructed notion of femininity, through-in the caparison she wears, may wear a plaid shirt.

          Indeed, there is much to be said in wearing a plaid shirt, and the nature of the person who wears it. Though it puzzles me to wonder which informs the what. It seems obvious that the title, expression, nature or conception of a person indicates the way the story of a worn plaid shirt should be read. But what of the incongruous, or the selecting and wearing of a plaid shirt, altogether arbitrarily. Then perhaps the story the plaid shirt tells is false, and little can be said or sold or stated that could indicate the correlation between the sort of person a person is and a plaid shirt.

         So too it depends on the society, for what if there was a place where the plaid shirt stands and is worn only by the greatest of the great. An expensive item, well sought after, in high demand and kept prized like some limited edition something. I do not mean to discuss the history of plaid, or tartan, though – or the ways in which it may have been regarded as something more than what it is right here, right now, right today in this place.

         I think though, I should like to express a story about one particular plaid shirt:

         

         Smoke billowed, not altruistically, but causally – from some machine designed to produce smoke. I wonder if the haze produced is to make people appear more attractive, thanks to the ocular obscurity, or to imitate some sort of feeling of mystery, unknown and disco-inspired continuity.

          I stood in the smoke though, amongst it, within it – allowing it to swill or swizzle around me. I danced too, had been dancing, continued to dance, and remained dancing – indefinitely within or because of the smoke. I wondered if I looked more attractive, or more mysterious. Was there a possibility that I could look both? Or was that too subjective to think too hard or long about?

         It was true though, my vision was impaired by the smoke, and I guzzled my drink and danced, trying not to worry too much about what I could not see around me. It was okay, for the smoke began to clear shortly – surely because the machine only expelled its haze periodically.

         The wavering human outlines around me began to evolve into solid forms and shapes – not dazzling or impressionable ones – but ordinary ones. The sort of ordinary that is so ordinary that it does not make most people yawn – because it is a given that it is so ordinary. My beverage was alcoholic, and I am sure everyone else's was too. For the people all about me and their dancing appeared sporadic and unenlightened, undoubtedly drink induced, and lusty.

         It did not appear that there should be anything too special in the world though. Dancing was dancing and drinking was drinking, and the correlation was obvious. Asian girls attracted the most attention, and Indian or Pakistani or Arabic men received the most denigration. I am sure I only saw one black person that night though, and white people require no comment at this point.

         But the issue is little to do with race, and very much to do with observation. Participant observation you could call it at this point, for I was there, fitting in, entertaining the same thoughts and mindless rort as all those others about me. However, I was looking – and sometimes I agree it is hard to know whether I am looking about in that same provocative and sultry manner that bar fly's do – but nonetheless I was looking, in some way, whatever way! Anyway, either way – I was looking at the people all about me.

         I am sure many eyes met mine. I am sure that many eyes saw me, or had already seen me, but now saw me looking back at them too. There were so many eyes! The eyes of women and men, imploring, horny, barely conscious and rabid. While enjoyment was obvious, happiness was not. Happiness seemed amiss. But that did not trouble me.

         I am sure I must have pirouetted, or something like that, for I noticed then, in the corner of that smoky and dark dance floor, something unsound. While happiness may have been amiss, there was a unity, a togetherness, that made such an ambivalent pastime appear quite congruous. But now there was something that struck me as all together different.

         Pleasantly, I am sure I blinked. My dancing and my drinking not faltering, I continued to look. There was something unsightly about it – something unfortunate and reckless. Something that did not complement the dance floor. Any semblance of clemency that I might have felt prior to this ghastly sight was presently eschewed. There, worn by a tall young man, was a plaid shirt. Not just any plaid shirt mind you, it was an obscene purple. A bright and unavoidable purple, with black checks across it. A dire and disturbing vision, that materialised there, right in the corner of the dance floor, hardly moving in time with the music. I turned away then, eager to avoid the offensive garment and the person wearing it.

         Albeit, I had hardly been on my game that night anyway – but this turn of events really threw me off. I felt disgusted, but also disgusting. It was a suffocating and bothersome feeling, that I could not shake, even though I had turned my back to the plaid shirt. I was sure that this horrible feeling, this intense hatred of the purple plaid shirt could not possibly be unwarranted.

         I digressed from my observation of the dance floor and became introspective. It is a poor habit of mine, as thinking too much can be quite problematic. But here I felt it might be necessary to avoid some unprecedented outburst in the name of something so seemingly innocent.

         I am sure I must have been on the brink of some nervous breakdown, for my thoughts were illogical and unattenuated. The fear and phobia was rising under my skin, and I am sure I have never felt anything quite like the way I felt then. It was really quite a strange thing to think that something as inconsequential as a plaid shirt could be so bothersome to me.