When all this remote work started, I was probably a lot like you. Breaking out into song every few minutes, tap dancing my way through meetings when a comment wasn’t even necessary and clapping – lots and lots of clapping. Clapping has taken the place of shaking hands, because it’s two hands coming together for a common goal. Only in this case, both hands are mine. We’re all just trying to get by, but some of us are trying to move up, climb up onto the corporate ladder.
It’s the rickety one in the corner. With splinters protruding, missing bars and the carved initials of every ambitious young careerist who’s climbed before you. It’s been leaning for years, slipping, sliding, barely maintaining its balance. And this economy sure ain’t helping. Once you climb a couple rungs there’s no turning back. It’s far too dangerous. The ladder sways back and forth after the mildest of wind gusts, nearly collapsing at the closing bell each day. I bet you thought that first internship was a notch in your resume. As it turns out, it can’t help you here.
The universal dream is that we get plucked from obscurity about halfway up the ladder by a headhunter operating a cherry picker. They’re not licensed to drive the thing, but how hard could it be? You reach out and grab. There’s not much to it.
A couple weeks into working from home I watched myself begin to lose my way. First I skipped a couple days of shaving. That’s okay. It would still take me to Bastille Day to grow a beard. That's July 14th for those who don't have the day circled on their calendars with a note to buy wine. But going unshaven was the first step towards total resignation. Then came the sweatpants. The ones with holes, salsa stains and other remnants condiments I didn’t realize I enjoyed until spending this much time at home. I caulked the bathroom floor tile with mayo just the other day. The thing is, even sweatpants can feel like formal attire after a while, when everyone you work with is also wearing workout gear. Is this what the future looks like?
I had to change something. And do it quickly. Then I woke up fed up, in dire need of more comfort and protection. 30-gallon garbage bags with some slight hemming all of a sudden looked attractive. I was nearly post-clothing. But those bags aren’t mine to wear. They’re for refuse, rubbish, recycling and trash. Who am I to appropriate such items for my selfish sartorial choices?
Then I came upon a quote that changed my life. It spoke of Winston Churchill when he first visited the Western Front during World War I. He was, to put it charitably, a man of exquisite leisure. I thought, great, I too am a man of leisure. Someone who prefers baths to the elliptical machine and roast duck sandwiches to a lone stick of celery, tragically and minimally masticated by all who grab ahold of it.
“He was a middle-aged man accustomed to indulgence, whose skin felt unchafed only when caressed by silk.”
This is how we survive. Not by dressing down, but by going all in. Thus I began wearing a tie every day henceforth. Civilization can’t crumble if we’re all wearing ties. Can it? Have you even tried to pick up a trash can and throw it through a parked car while wearing suspenders? You don't really have enough flexibility to do the deed. You might burn someone in effigy donning a three piece suit, but that doesn't mean you'll be wearing one. The fact that you’re slightly uncomfortable keeps your primal instincts at bay.
If rioters won’t dress up, then I will.
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