Sometimes I don't know whether to rant and rave about fashion, or to simply laugh at it. I do know that it amazes me that so many people are so hung up on what a few designers ordain as fit and proper to wear.

It intrigues me that one year the designers will tell the world that one will look his or her best only if wearing garments that make the shoulder's look like a linebacker's on Superbowl Sunday. Then, the next year, it turns out that only narrow shoulders are really attractive. Can't the consumer consider the fact that these designers make big money by selling clothes and if styles weren't to change, there would be a decrease in the amount of clothing sold, and a concomitant reduction in the income of the designer? The basic drive behind the designer is not to create the perfect design that will stand forever as a testament to good taste, but to make as much money as possible.

I think clothes should be comfortable, durable, appropriate for the climate, and suitable in terms of that society's modesty beliefs. Give me a pair of blue jeans, a sports shirt or polo shirt, comfortable shoes, and I am happy. If I wear cut-offs, it is because it is warm and the cut-offs help me to feel cool; it is not because fashion has dictated that I must wear cut-offs with the legs of such and such a length. I don't worry about wearing my baseball cap backwards or off to one side. I wear it forward because then the bill helps to shade my eyes. If someone thinks that by doing so I appear as a nerd or whatever, then fine, so be it. To paraphrase Dr. Frasier Crane, a scanning electron microscope would be unable to locate my concern for how someone else feels about my lack of adherence to fashion.

Now, before someone dredges up history on me and reports how at one time I dressed like everyone else, wore my hair like everyone else, even walked liked like everyone else, let me admit it. It's true. I did once dress, act, and walk like everyone else. Of course, that was in the Army and I was given little choice in the matter. Now I am a big boy and I can dress the way I want. I choose to dress for personal comfort and not because some designer in some country has had a vision.