On the one hand I’ve always thought that humanity would be best served by the absolution of fashion all together. If it were accepted that everyone, of every stripe, of every social standing and rank should simply wear a grey sweat-suit or a navy blue jumpsuit everyday, that would be fine with me. ⊕ It would save us all a lot of time and energy. ⊕ But on the other hand I understand that fashion is meant to be both a means of personal expression and a peacock feather of status. So why is it that the everyday uniform of modern man (and I am talking strictly about men here) has come to be the shapeless tan cotton pant, the artlessly cheap rubber-soled shoe, and the totally untailored (in most cases totally ill-fitting) woven shirt? ⊕ Is This the best we can muster? What has happened to us?

The assumption might be made that it’s all about comfort. That perhaps men of ages past would sigh longingly at our elastic-waisted pants, our stained, threadbare tees ⊕ our oversized polo shirts, our torn jeans, and think, “If only I could have such roomy pants to fart in! Such soft, tent-like garments to cover my huge belly!” But somehow I doubt it. I imagine rather they would do what they did best and snort derisively, looking down upon us as the slovenly rabble which we do, in fairness, appear to be. 

Not one of us thinks that silk tights and brocade cod-pieces ought to make a comeback, of that I am sure and in total agreement, but there has been middle ground, certainly, between looking like a shakespearean actor, in drag, playing Desdemona and the style-less khaki-wrapped lumps we’ve become. Most men, I’ll assume, don’t give a Saturday-morning-crap about fashion, just as I’ve professed myself, and would much rather simply blend in with the crowd, not being noticed one way or the other. To “care” is not to be masculine. I get this. To some degree I agree with this. ⊕

Since making the transition from self-consciously clad art-school hipster to ordinary dude I’ve been of the opinion that the best style is the one that invited no preconceptions, that says almost nothing specific about you whatsoever. ⊕ The lack of affected “stance” or statement in ones dress is the preferred statement in my estimation.

If we men do not care an ounce about fashion and want simply to not to stand out then it is the fault of the accepted standards which leads us to look like such sloppy imagination-less douchebags all the time. Though I don’t want to expend any unnecessary mental energy on clothing I am none the less an aesthetic person. Hence I sometimes wish that the fashion landscape I would blend myself into would be one with a bit more… style. Or at very least a bit more nuance. Ask yourself: how is it that even when men wore little more than a single long piece of fabric folded about them and sandals on their feet that they still managed to carry it with more style than we do today?

Is it simply that we, as an enlightened culture, no longer care about superficial things like appearances? HA HA HAA! No fucking way.

The arguments could be made that this state of slovenly disarray has its roots in modern notions of masculinity, in the pure economics of manufacturing and population size, in the rise of the middle class, or in plain ol’ laziness. It’s likely a mixture of those factors and other more subtle ones I haven’t even guessed at. But then it wasn’t until the late 50’s that the final casting-off of finery really began in America ⊕ and there were at least 4 decades in which modernity and higher standards of dress overlapped.

I often wonder why dress-codes of the 10’s - 40’s ever went out of favor for men. Just too much of a hassle? After all who among us have not watched a noirish movie populated with smartly dressed guys in tailored suits, with cufflinks, and a fedora and thought, “Man, I’d look like cool in that!” But of course, you can’t dress in a three piece suit with a felt hat and watch fob dangling from your vest today can you? The social decorum which necessitated such snappy dress no longer exists and so you would stand out rather than blend in. Point is we guys don’t really have much to choose from today. If we want to maintain that blessed state of virtual invisibility we must do so in the sloppy cotton rags once set aside for hobos and men who pushed manure carts. I guess, in the end, I just think compared to all that came before we’ve settled into something very… boring. Ah well, time marches on and the grass is always greener.

“Do I support the Arts” you gleaming-toothed little twit of a solicitor? What exactly is it you want? To pry some of my hard-earned lucre from my wallet? What are you trying to get at with your seemingly guileless but culturally loaded opening salvo? It’s money right? Why not just get yourself a tin-can and a cardboard sign like any respectable beggar? Do a little dance at least. Sing for your non-profit’s supper.

Course, I didn’t say any of that. I like to at least pretend at civility when it comes to my fellow humans. Don’t want to rend the social fabric after all and send us tumbling backward into public defecation and cannibalism. What I said was simply:

“Yes.”

And it was true. I do.

“Wow, that’s great. May I ask how?” the twit responded in his carefully rehearsed solicitor’s version of familiar speech, betrayed, as it often is, by the inclusion of the the overly polite, or overly formal. These guys just can’t seem to nail realistic dialogue.

“Well, actually, it’s funny that you ask…” I began.

I often like to stop cold after a statement like “it’s funny that you ask.” The person your speaking with knows full well that something is to follow, that’s the whole point of an old chestnut like “it’s funny that you ask,” and they’ll generally wait patiently for the punch-line, allowing an unnaturally long pause in conversation. Seeing how long is the fun part. With solicitors an awkward pause in conversation is like a glimpse into the slavering maw of Death. In this case I managed a full 6 seconds before sensing an interjection, and continued.

“It’s funny that you ask because I only just left a doctor’s office who gave me some test results. Coincidentally they answer your question better than I ever could. I’ve got some pictures here taken with an electron microscope. Would you like to see them?”

Before letting him answer I produced the images and brandished them right up in front his oxy-cleaned pores.

They looked like this:

I saw a mixture of confusion and revulsion in his eyes. He looked instinctually to his identically dressed cohort who was, unfortunately for him, busy accosting someone else, and unable to offer cover fire.

“I’m not sure I understand. What are they?” he bleated.

“They are Art of course! Art seen at 1,000,000 times magnification. You asked whether I supported the Arts and as you can see clearly from these I do. Art is a parasite and we are embraced in a mutualist waltz of sorts.

Art has lodged itself in places throughout my body. Since childhood, when I was initially infected, it has spread everywhere. It’s in my bowels, my heart, and my brain. It nourishes itself on my insides and It floods me with chemicals. Had it not been for this infestation I might have gone into the sciences! But Art wouldn’t allow it. It influences my decisions. It’s disgusting little flagellum run over every inch of my guts. It’s eggs are buried in me. It takes everything it needs to survive from me.

In return it offers me occasional delusions of grandeur. It tricks my mind into perceiving some kind of purpose. It keeps me from putting a rifle in my mouth or in yours. It keeps me from building bombs in my basement. It keeps me from disemboweling people on the street. It offers me some kind of hope. You see? Art and I are engaged in a symbiotic relationship. I keep it alive, it keeps me relatively sane. Get it?”

“...”

“So yes, I support the Arts, bodily, as a host.”

“Well that’s not really what I was asking Sir.”

“I know. You want money. ‘Can ya’ spare a dime for a cultural institution that’s down on it’s luck?’ I understand. Well how about this, I’ll just keep the money and cut out the middle man. How’s that? Easier, don’t you think?”

I walked away from the shiny-toothed little shit-head then, happy to have given him a small taste straight from the teat which he harassed people on behalf of, and I could swear, as I eased on down the road, I heard him say to his coconspirator:

“God! I hate Artists.”

Note: The original microscopy images used to make up the “Art parasites” above were taken from here and here. Both very nice resources.

By the 1930’s many more cities followed, striking similar bargains with the sky.

“We’ll give up all sense of natural scale if you allow us to build.”

“We’ll sacrifice our conception of a horizon-line.”

“We’ll part with our view of the sun-set and sun-rise.”

“We’ll depend on others, with a better vantage point, to tell us where the
clouds are, what they’re up to, and where they’re going.”

“We’ll eschew use of the stars and depend on technology to tell us where
we are and where we’re going.”

“We’ll stop gawking and staring at you all the time.”

Etc.

New York, being the shrewd merchant city that its always been, gobbled up more sky real-estate, quicker, and with more gusto, than just about anyone else. The sky had plenty of space after all, more than the pigeons and house sparrows need to stretch their wings, and we needed somewhere to put our chandeliers and ceiling fans, so it was a sort of “infest-destiny” that we colonize the sky.

Over time we developed so much of that once empty air that today you can hardly stand anywhere, on any street, and see more than a small, jagged, puzzle-piece of sky. The electric lights wash out the stars and the sun is something sensed or seen in reflection. Truth is most of us don’t even bother to look up. “We live and work in the sky, we don’t gape at it. Snort!”

For those of you who live in areas where atmospheric zoning-laws are more strict, and who look out your windows everyday to see vast horizons and giant skies, let me walk you through a day of our metropolitan skies:

Sunrise

A Bright Sunny Day

Sunset

A Clear Starry Night

I’ve blacked-out the buildings to accentuate the actual sky quotient of each scene. Admittedly there is something cool about these odd “bolts” of sky in this context, (they remind me of Clyfford Still paintings, which “me likey” very much indeed) but I can’t help but wonder what does this sky deprivation do to the human brain? What is the effect of having no horizon? (other than, in the lack of sunset to ride off into, discouraging a heavy cowboy population.) What effects do the tightly packed high walls and lack of spacial depth do to our outlook? 

I love my city and applaud our audacious sky-conquering forbearers. The stacking of people has allowed for the mind-expansion part and parcel to a melting pot. It wouldn’t have been possible any other way. Never the less, setting the questionable psychological effects aside, I feel I need to point out one bit of possible shortsightedness in the upward expansion model-

Namely the totally crappy view we’ll have of possibly momentous events in human history! If anything of importance happens in the sky, we shlubs on the ground won’t be able to see jack-shit! I’m not talking about events as piddling as Forth of July fireworks, which, in the city are inevitably best viewed like:

this

I’m talking about potentially earth-shattering stuff here! For instance? Well:

I could also mention how crappy a view we urbanites would have of the great big beautiful sun after it went Red Giant, turning into human char-broil without even getting any decent photo-ops for our trouble, but I’m confident we won’t be around long enough to bitch about that one.

I suspect the city officials have intuited this shortcoming for a long time, they were no dummies after all.

An example: Seems that way back in ‘37 there was talk of launching the Hindenburg out of Manhattan. ⊕ Mysteriously, at the last minute, the Mayor and his inner circle scrapped the plan and the flight was switched to taking off from the Frankfurt airfield. I suppose they knew that a view like this:

just wouldn’t have made as cool an album cover.

Point is as great as the city is, as clever as our upward expansion has been, as majestic as our buildings are, our relationship to the sky and it’s goings on are forever compromised. How this ultimately effects us as humans I have no idea but as a New Yorker I can only hope nothing worth seeing ever happens up there.

First some back story:

A think-tank in my employ came to a problematic conclusion recently, that though I call this site The Nonist, I, its author, am not in fact truly free of “isms.” It was an unpleasant finding to be sure. It struck me immediately that if word got out it could be quite embarrassing. My P.R. firm agreed whole heartedly and recommended swift action be taken.

In an effort to strip me of as many “isms” as realistically possible my stable of mystics, eugenicists, astronomers, and rogue-scientists have since been busy with a harrowing undertaking: to break apart the jumbled mass of choices that make up my Being in hopes of reverse engineering them and tracing particular flaws to their root causes. It’s been hard going and the results are by no means finalized. However, as is the case with many scientific undertakings, there have been discoveries made only tangentially related to the goal.

Which brings me to the “miniscule choice” I referred to earlier.

We have discovered a conclusive and reliable method to test for cynicism in humans. And believe me there is none of that poetic, wishy-washy, stuff about half-full / half-empty glasses involved. The test is simple and repeatable. All that’s required is access to The Food Network on your cable television.

To administer the test on your self simply do the following:

1. Turn on your television.
2. Enter the digits on your remote control which correspond to The Food Network or some similar program in which a “chef” prepares a meal in the course of an episode.
3. Watch the program until the climactic moment.
4. Take note of your own reaction to said climactic moment.

You’re finished, test complete. You now know for certain whether you are a cynic.

Let me explain:

During most television programs in which a “chef” prepares a meal the episode unfolds in a similar way. Ingredients are chosen. Anecdotes are told. Ingredients are manipulated. More anecdotes are told. Ingredients are cooked. Further anecdotes are told until finally the ingredients are gathered together and plated. These steps all lead directly to the climactic moment: the “chef” tasting the meal he or she has just prepared.

It is the choice of reaction to this crux which reveals cynicism in humans.

If you, as a viewer, watch the “chef” put a spoonful of food in their mouth, watch as they chew for a moment impartially blank-faced, then watch as the facial expression of the “chef” changes to one of eye-popping, head-lolling delight; if you hear the exclamatory sounds of pleasure and (after the careful, orgasmic, chewing is finished) the breathy statement of “Now that… is incredible” and you choose to believe, thinking to yourself, “That must have been… incredible.” Then you my friend are not a cynic. Congratulations.

If, however, you watch the “chef” put a spoonful of food ⊕ in their mouth, watch as they chew the food ⊕ impartially blank-faced, then watch as the facial expression of the “chef” changes ⊕ to one of ⊕ eye-popping, ⊕ head-lolling delight; if you hear the exclamatory sounds of pleasure ⊕ and (after the careful, orgasmic, chewing is finished) the breathy ⊕ statement of “Now that… is incredible” and you choose to reject them utterly, thinking to yourself, “Bullshit. Tastes like poached couch-cushion for all I know!” Then you my friend are without doubt a cynic. Congratulations.

You see, as my staff of ambivalent mercenaries and avant-garde pediatrists have explained to me, the entire production is artifice. The kitchen is a set, the time is shifted, the chef is cooking for no-one, the senses involved in the production and its consumption do not include taste, and you can never, ever, ever ⊕ take a bite of that food yourself. You can never know the truth of its flavor. You know this. You tacitly agree to the illusion when you tune in.

Only a true cynic could sit through the entire preparation of a meal, fully aware of the artifice, and upon seeing the “tasting face” of the “chef” feel compelled to reject their sincerity.

So essentially, our calculations reveal, that if you see that “tasting face” and choose, knowing full well it’s all artifice, to scorn or mock the “chef” in your mind anyway, then you are indeed an unabashed, scientifically cerified cynic. Wonder no longer.

If you also happen to notice that the chef does not actually offer an itemized recipe for their dish on screen (the way cooking shows of old always did) presumably because it would undermine sales of their cookbook which is the true cash cow, well then you are a cynic extraordinaire! We doff our hats to your permanently furrowed brow.

In any case if you are addled by cynicism and want to cast it off or trade it for that prettier and shinier model- optimism, remember that each and every choice you make compounds like the bone-dust that comprise a giant’s bread. You must be aware of your decisions, even the smallest, if you are ever to change. A perfect place to start is with the “tasting face.” Teach yourself to believe that and you can believe almost anything. Here is your mantra: “Yum, it’s delicious!”

Say it with me: “Yum, it’s delicious!”

“Yum, it’s delicious!”

“Yum, it’s delicious!”

See you are well on your way. Now if you’ll excuse me my staff of discredited phrenologists and atonal flautists are eager to continue the “ism-stripping” by driving a 16 inch needle into my brain. Wish me luck. Ta-ta.