Sometimes when I actually give it some thought, I think about how drastic clothing fashion has changed in my lifetime. Especially, when you live in a small rural town where seeing someone in a suit with or without a tie is the absolute exception.
When I worked at an insurance company office for seven years in the late 1960's and just barely out of college, suit & tie for men was the norm. It does, today, seem rather absurd to sit around for eight hours every day doing paper work and no we didn't have computers.
Yes, we would sit there all day with a long sleeve shirt with a tie tightly around the neck. O.K. we could take off our suit jackets, but, the pants were still a blend of wool and not comfy cotton blend slacks of today. Also, men wore heavy brogue type shoes with leather soles.
Probably the best thing that happened to men's fashion was when the computer nerds, back in the 1980's and later, decided that it didn't make sense to sit around all day and in to the night in total discomfort. That was about the time Gap came on the scene and offered comfortable leisure clothes.
It is funny, to some degree, that formal or traditional men's clothing stores did not see the trend coming and kept trying to jam the suit and tie look down everyone's throat. A lot of them went out of business or had to merge.
The next time I have to attend a funeral or wedding, I am not going to worry about going out and buying a "suit" with or without a tie. Just maybe, I will take one of my shirts to the cleaners for a little starch and a descent pair of khaki's.
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