A Nation of Slobs. But then. . .

 

Cary Grant and Myrna Loy from Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House.

O.W. Root

@NecktieSalvage

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1h

People think I am exaggerating when I say 50% of people's problems, strife and anger would go away if they just started dressing well, but I'm not. Dressing in a way that makes you feel good about yourself will make you feel better about others and the world too.

This is both a revived thread, and a new one.  It's one of many topics that shows up here in one way or another, including in stored drafts that I start off on, and then fail to finish. 

This one started:  I wrote my first entry here and put it up for posting to be run yesterday.

Then I read this on Twitter:

Atticus Finch (of Georgia) 

@Atticus59914029

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46m

I had an attorney I had never met show up at my office to take a deposition one day in blue jeans - blue jeans! I was insulted and lost respect for that attorney. How we dress does matter. It is a form of manners.

I agree with that comment in that how we dress, matters.

But it does show the regional nature of things, but still we should consider this carefully.

I've posted on this before, but I used to wear dark black Levi's or Lees to court on occasion, combined with a sports coat and a tie.  When I did that, I'd wear cowboy boots as well.  Wearing cowboy boots to court is isn't unusual here.  I've seen it done a lot. 

In retrospect, I haven't seen the jeans, such as I noted, with sports coat and tie all that often, but I have seen it.  I very rarely do that anymore, however.  Part of the reason I do not, however, is that I don't travel nearly as much as I used to, thanks to COVID 19 and its impact on travel and the law.  Travel was routine, COVID came in, and hard behind COVID were Zoom and Teams.

Indeed, I've appeared in a few Teams hearing recently in which the Judge was in the same town as me.  Prior to Teams and Zoom, we had a few telephonic hearings we'd do, but if we were in town, we were expected to show up.  

Not anymore.

Anyhow, I've seen a lawyer wear blue jeans in court exactly once.  That particular lawyer was a working stockman and was appearing in the court in the county in which he lived.  Nobody said anything.  He was otherwise in jacket and tie.  I have seen lawyers in blue jeans in depositions plenty of times, however.  Most of the time prior to COVID it was in combination with jacket and tie, but even in the couple of years before COVID this was changing.

I still wear a tie.

I had some lawyers from Texas show up a while back and they were in jeans and new cowboy boots.  There's working cowboy boots (all of mine are of that type), "ropers", which aren't cowboy boots, dress boots that locals wear, and then the weird dress boots that locals don't wear, but Texans do.  

I don't get that kind.

Anyhow, in order to wear cowboy boots as dress shoes, you have to know how to wear cowboy boots.  Some people affect a high water appearance with their dress shoes, and frankly do so on purpose.  Men's trousers are supposed to "break" over the shoes.  I.e., you aren't supposed to see the socks.  But for some odd reason, some Ivy League educated people wear their trousers "high water" so you can always see their socks.

Stockmen, Sheridan Wyoming, 1944.  This is an interesting photograph and it must have been taken as something was going on in the town where the photo was taken, Sheridan Wyoming.  The clean white shirts are a pretty typical semi formal dress for ranchers.  All the hats are good (clean).  Only he older rancher with the beat up Montana Peak hat is wearing a suit.  The stockman on the left is wearing baggy jeans that drape over his heels, still a very common way to wear them amongst working stockmen.  All of the visible heels are "doggin' heels" which are common only amongst working stockmen.

Cowboy boots, properly worn, are never ever worn high water.

Anyhow, it's interesting to note, note that Atticus does, that years ago I went to a Federal Trial in Cheyenne in which I was making a very limited appearance. After the day I had dinner with the defendant, who had been a Supreme Court Justice in Montana (where they are elected).  The main lawyer in the matter wore a suit every day, but he wore dress cowboy boots with them.  The retired S.Ct justice, when that lawyer got up to do something, turned to me with real anger and noted, as I was wearing a suit with wingtips, that "I'm glad to see somebody dresses like a lawyer around here".

Given that at that time I often wore cowboy boots at work and even at court it was quite ironic.

The last time I wore cowboy boots in a trial was over a decade ago, I'm sure.*  It was a relatively long trial and I'd basically cycled through my dress clothes so I wore a sports coat, black Levi's and my cowboy boots.  Nobody said anything, but later the plaintiff's lawyer grieved the judge over something in another case and claimed, referring to this one, that he had favored me as he hadn't said anything about it while he had, she claimed, about her shoes.  I don't recall anything ever being said about her shoes.

That was the last time.  I didn't want to be seen to be inappropriate in any fashion, again.

That does bring up suits, however.

My legal assistant dresses professionally every day.  I really should.  I do a lot, as there are things I go to constantly in which I appear as a lawyer, and I feel that I should dress as a lawyer is expected to, when I do, which involves at least wearing a button down shirt (usually white) and a tie

I do the same for depositions, but I"m almost the only one anymore.  I'll go to a deposition and everyone is dressed down in blue jeans and the like.  People actually comment as I'm not dressed in that fashion.

Indeed, I went to the eye doctor's the other day and was dressed for work, which on that occasion was khaki trousers, button down shirt, and a tie.  The person who checked me in joked that "I was too fancy to be there".

Times have really changed.  I recall a time when you went to the doctor's office and the doctors where wearing ties, or alternatively a smock that buttoned to the neck.

Physicians in the 1940s

Dentist into the 1980s, which I know due to my household, wore a dress shirt and sports coat to work, then a dental smock at work.  My father preferred clip on ties, probably has he had to change back and forth.

When I was growing up, I didn't know how to tie a tie.

Probably a lot of kids in my generational cohort didn't.  I didn't wear ties growing up. I never went to a school that had uniforms, and the dress code, to the extent there was one, seems to have largely pertained to junior high, where (boys) were not allowed to wear t-shirs advertising beer, and girls were not allowed to wear halter tops.  I can recall a boy being sent to the office once for wearing a beer t-shirt, although he'd worn it before, and a girl being sent for wearing a halter top that was quite a bit too less, so to speak.

Junior high and high school here were like the Wild West when I attended and by high school the authorities had simply given up on dress codes, I think.  We were largely self policing however, as by that time self appearance standards start to awkwardly kick in.  Kid from ranches dressed lake cowboys of the era and they were the real deal.  Otherwise we wore typical clothing of the era, which often involved t-shirts, which is odd to look back on now as I'm always cold and I never just wear a t-shirt anymore (I've had people comment on that).    Girls had generally become quite self conscious and therefore wore nicer clothes than boys as a rule, although the code, to the extent there was one, had clearly been suspended to the extent that I recall being confronted in a crowded hall by an amply endowed girl I did not know who had chosen to come to school in a very thing t-shirt and no brassier, which would have gotten a person sent home in any other era.**  It was shocking enough that I recall it even now, over 40 years later.

Events, I'd note, largely didn't require a tie.  I.e., school events.  We didn't dress up for nearly anything.  More significant social events, however were different, such as weddings or funerals, which is tough if you don't actually own any dress clothes and you've never had to wear them, particularly in the 1970s.  The 70s were a black hole for dress clothes with awful suits and loud or pastel colors.  I recall my father and I having to go out to get some dress trousers for me for a wedding and ending up with pastel light blue polyester dress pants, a true horror.  I hated them then, and I still do.

Anyhow, a self declared position of mine in my late teens was that I was never going to have a job in which I had to wear a tie every day.  It was arrogant and naive, but it did express my career goals quite well.  I thought at the time I'd work outdoors in one of the sciences.

Be that as it may, soon after high school I attended basic training, and learned how to tie a tie there.  The Army still issues ties.  I still tie a tie the way I learned at Ft. Sill, Oklahoma.

Even as a geology student I started to learn how to dress more formally, and thankfully the horrific polyester era was over.  For the most part I dressed every day as geologist in the field do.  I wore L. L. Bean chamois shirts in the winter and t-shirts in the summer.  By that time, however, I was gravitating strongly back to the rural dress patter, reinforced by basic training, where we the original patter heavy BDU shirt every day, unless it was the surface temperature of the sun, at which point we could go down to t-shirts.  Cowboys, you'll note, almost always ear long sleeve shirts and frankly anymore, I do too.  Just recently, in fact, somebody asked me "do you ever wear a t-shirt".  I truthfully answered, "yes, underneath a long sleeve shirt".

My parents taught me well, but it took some time for me to learn.

In law school our professors dressed professionally every day.  Men wore jacket and tie every day, and one professor, our business law professor, wore a suit every day.,  Oddly, it didn't make an impression on me at the time, but it sunk enough, I guess, that by the time I was getting ready to graduate I knew how to dress like a lawyer.  By the summer before I graduated I owned two Brooks Brothers suits, one bought for a wedding, and two Brooks Brothers ties.  I still have one of the ties.

I don't have either suit.  Suits, I've found cause an odd waist line expansion on me such that all I have to do in order to gain weight is buy a suit.  In fairness, at the time I bought the first two I was incredibly, probably dangerously, think. There's a long story behind that, but I'm not naturally really thin.  My father and grandfather were stout.  Not fat, but stout.  My mother was think, and seemingly everyone in her entire family is.  I seem to fit in somewhere in between, but having been a bit stout when I was in junior high and the first two years of high school (and then having rocketed to thin), I've always been a bit conscious of it and I do tend to watch my weight.  I'm as heavy now as I've ever been, but I'm still not approaching stout.

When I was first practicing law, the rules of dressing were made plain to me on day one.  In the winter we wore shirt and tie every day.  In the summer, we could wear polo shirts in the office.  Court rules had at one time provided that during the summer lawyers could wear short sleeved dress shirts and ties, and dispense with jackets, and the "Summer Rules" were still cited, even though they were no longer published as they had been.  I've never owned a short sleeved dress shirt and I've never appeared in court without a jacket.  About fifteen years after that a new district court judge imposed new rules, which included no khaki trousers in court.

Still, even before COVID, things were really changing.  You'd see lawyers wearing ties in their offices less and less.  Levi's began to appear.  And COVID just put things in the basement.  Lawyers will now appear in Zoom meetings with the Court without jacket and tie (not me).  I had one senior Court lawyer hold a meeting in which he didn't have one.  It's been odd.

And I dress way down in the office if I don't have to meet anyone.

I presently have two suits, only one of which I really like.  I wish I had a double breasted suit like two Brooks Brothers suits I've owned in the past.  They seem really hard to get now. The good one I have is a heavy wool suit. I have a grey wool suit that's just too thin.  I need to have, really, at least two more suits but I haven't had a long trial since COVID and I keep thinking, at age 61, that I only have a few more years of practice and I don't want to invest in work clothing that will likely outlast me.

The other one now has some very tiny holes, which would likely indicate some moths got to it at some time.  It's hard to notice, but there there.  It's embarrassing.

So I need to get some new suits, I guess.

And not just that

Ties I've had from the first years of my practice have really lasted, but I'm starting to throw them out as worn.  I can't really ignore that any longer.  And having waited to long, the bill for suiting back up is going to be monstrous, and at age 62, sort of a bad, if necessary, investment.  I'll have to practice until I"m 80, or start wearing ties to Mass or something, to make that pay off.

Footnotes

*I've never had a pair of "dress cowboy boots", like many people do.  I've had cowboy boots for a long time, of course, but never a fancy pair.  Every pair I've ever owned was a working pair, even if they were reserved for office and town wear at first.

 My regular cowboy boots.  The ones I wear to work, when I wear cowboy boots to work.

My working cowboy boots.

I wear cowboy boots in the office less than I used to for a couple of reasons.  One is that I often wear a pair of "ropers" that were bought for my son.  They're Ariats and really comfortable, and look Western.  The other is that I have arthritis in my right foot from an accident years ago, and my old cowboy boots sometimes get uncomfortable, and sometimes they don't, at the office.

**

"Mr. Bernstein: A fellow will remember a lot of things you wouldn't think he'd remember. You take me. One day, back in 1896, I was crossing over to Jersey on the ferry, and as we pulled out, there was another ferry pulling in, and on it there was a girl waiting to get off. A white dress she had on. She was carrying a white parasol. I only saw her for one second. She didn't see me at all, but I'll bet a month hasn't gone by since that I haven't thought of that girl."

Citizen Kane.  

I have found this observation from this movie to be really true.  The fact that I can recall the incident clearly is something I find curious.  That was the one and only time I ever encountered the girl noted, and I'm not pining for her, nor even proud of the recollection, but it's really clear.  I stepped around a student and she was right there.  She was short and Hispanic and looked up at me, but she was really showing, and probably conscious of it and embarrassed.  I was too.  It was only a very brief encounter, but for whatever reason, I can still recall it pretty readily, but I don't think about it every month.

Memory is interesting.

As a highly introverted trial lawyer, one of the things I dread the most is . . .

the stream of post trial people that show up in my office the day after a trial.

People tell me that I'm good with a jury and that they react well to me.  They say the same thing about the witnesses. If that's true it's because I really don't think being a lawyer means all that much.  Contrary to what people think, it doesn't mean you are smart or even accomplished.  What it might mean is a topic for some other post.  Anyhow, being introverted doesn't mean that you can't address people or speak to them, it means something else.  For one thing, it means you are really private.

I don't like reliving trials.  Lawyers, it seems, like to tell "war stories", but they aren't war stories.  Every trial is a tragedy of some sort.  Revisiting tragedies in which I participated isn't really my thing, and lots of visitors in a single day coming back and asking "what happened in the trial?" is sort of an introverts nightmare.

Another oddity, really just mine, is that when you have a trial in town, you draw an audience from your own firm for closings.  I'm not shy about public speaking, but I hate a close in audience, by which I mean an audience of your friends, family, or coworkers.  It's too much like Monday Night Football and there you are, on the screen, and everyone else is in the audience judging which plays you should have made.  It does draw to mind, however, T.R.'s famous "Man in the Arena" speech.

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Anyhow, I'd prefer not to have an audience.

On that, however, I'm continually amazed by how the mind of the gregarious works.  There I am, without a closing even having been delivered, when a coworker who knows the party is stating to him "let's go get a Scotch after the trial".

What?

All I want to do is to go home.  I'm not keen on Scotch, but I'll take an Irish Whiskey, preferably with my long suffering spouse and the dog.

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist 83d Edition. The law and refusal to depart, departing in the worst way, echoes of service.

The old lawyers.

I was on a phone hearing recently and one of the lawyers, whom I used to run into a fair amount but have not for years, sounded really rough.  In a subsequent phone call he sounded the same way, and I looked up his firm photo and realized he is now 76 years old.

76.

What the crap?

In his photo, he looked haggard and ancient.

I was at something else not too long ago and saw another lawyer I used to run into a fair amount, who always had a youthful appearance even though I knew he was at least  decade.  I was shocked by his appearance.  

He's now 83.  He might just be practicing part time, I'd note.

I spoke to a lawyer friend of mine who is now up over 70, I think.  He doesn't appear worn or drawn down, but he told me that he's afraid of retiring as he enjoys the social interaction of the lawyers.  We discussed another lawyer who is a friend of his whom I figure is now in his mid 70s.

 There's something deeply wrong with all of this.

This reflects, I'll note, in our society at large, of course.  Our last qualified President, Joe Biden was in his 80s, and clearly suffering from mental decline, when he left office in defeat.  A recent book regarding the 2024 election reports, in hte opinion of hte authors, that Biden believes he's smarkter than everyone else which formed the basis of his disaterous decision.  Our current chief executive is also, in my view, suffering from dementia at an increasing rate that can't be ignored, but which is largely being ignored, even as he destroys the economy, foreign relations, and American democracy.  He also seems to suffer from "only I can do it" delusion, and on at least one occasion in the 2024 campaign said as much.

Biden was a lawyer, eons ago.  Trump is a real estate developer, so that's a bit off point. But there's something really pathetic about lawyers who practice past their 60s.  I'm in my early 60s, I'd note.  They've lost something of their soul, if not their souls in general, and have nothing left but their work.*

There's also something societally wrong with a society that allows this to occur.  I'll avoid the political discussion, but mental decline is inevitable in almost everyone who lives past their 50s.  People don't want to believe it, but it's absolutely true.

And beyond that, society should not encourage the elderly to occupy positions such as this past their mid 60s.  It takes up space that should be filled by younger people.  By that point a peson should be ready to retire, and if they're not, they're never going to be ready, economically.  Talent wise, they should apply their talents and time to something else.

Read a book, train a dog, go fishing.  Discovery the person you were when you started out, and the one you apparently lost.

Mehr Mensch sein.

Service.

Vietnam service ribbon.

This will be an odd one, and it'll sound difficult not to make it should like I'm being unduly critical.

We've been running a lot of posts recently about the collapse of South Vietnam in 1975.  Nearly daily, as we're in the cycle in which things were becoming a disaster for the Republic of Vietnam, and a war which we entered in the early 1960s, and left in 1973, was about to be lost by the country we supported.

I note this as it's struck me for a long time how many professionals I know, including lawyers, who are of the Vietnam War generation and have no military service.

Not all, I'll note.  One former Federal District Court judge here was an artillery observer in Vietnam, and a lawyer in our capital city was an artilleryman.  Two state district court judges I know served in Vietnam.  And a few other lawyers I know did.

But by and large, most didn't.

It's interesting in a number of ways, one being that it's likely their father's all had served in World War Two.

Now, the Second World War was a huge war, to be sure.  But as a member of Generation Jones, when I was growing up, it was the case that if our fathers hadn't served in World War Two, they had in the Korean War, or on either side of it.  Growing up, this was so routine you simply assumed it.  I recall always being surprised if a kid I knew had a father who had never served in the Armed Forces, and this included professionals.  All the doctors and dentists that my father was friends with had served in World War Two or in the Armed Forces after that.  I didn't know but one lawyer then, but he'd served in the Post War Army and later on the older lawyers I knew who were of World War Two vintage had served, often quite heroically, in the war.

Baby Boom generation male lawyers?  Not so much.

I don't think that's a good thing, frankly.  War is awful but most American servicemen who served in the 60s nad early 70s didn't see a day of fighting.  The Service is full of men who aren't like you, who didn't grow up like you, and don't have any of your per service shared experiences.  That's valuable.

Lots of those guys would have been better men had they served.**  Donald Trump would have been.

And American society would be.  We really started dividing the country back into the haves, and have nots, but allowing so many who could afford an education to avoid serving.  It helped split hte country into the mess it is now.***

"Biased, Misguided WY Judges and Lawyers."

So claimed Wyoming's Congressional delegation about a letter signed by over 100 Wyoming lawyers.

I'm not a signatory to it as, frankly, I was too busy to notice its circulation when it was going around.  The letter is 100% correct, however.  I know a lot of the lawyers who did sign it, and more of a few of them are actual conservatives, and a few of them were once very significant figures in the Wyoming Republican Party, including those who were elected to office.  

Moreover, at least two of the three of the Congressional delegation itself are not anywhere near as populist as they now assert they are.  All three of these figures would have supported this letter under different circumstances, and two out of the three undoubtedly still hold the view that the lawyers are right, but are taking their positions as they do not wish to anger Trump supporters.  If the wind turns, they'll turn with it so rapidly that it will toss MAGA right off the decks.

All of which is profoundly sad.  That people hold one view and then express another one publicly is no doubt common, but it's not admirable, and is far from admirable in a situation like this.   It’s one of the things that’s really wrong with American politics today.

It is interesting t have even with the taking of extreme positions like this, at least one refused to publicly adopt the extreme Executive Power doctrine that’s being exercised now, while at the same time, not disavowing it.  John Barrasso, when asked if the President really had the power to levy tariffs the way he is (he doesn’t) just twice said that Congress had delegated a lot of power to the President.  It has.  It’s not a good thing, and he wouldn’t say that it is.

It does make sitting back and letting things happen easier.  The entire country is going to suffer massively due to Trump, and Wyoming is going to take a bruising.  It’d be far better to stand up and say so now, and take the lumps if they come, then to excuse your conduct later.

Footnotes

*Coincidentally, I saw this in our local newspaper in an advice column.

Dear Eric: I was an attorney when I started having memory problems at age 65. I retired and subsequently learned that I had a devastating rare dementia with a very short lifespan. Instead of providing me support, my friends disappeared from my life, at the time I needed them most. Friends may rally around you when you have cancer, driving you to chemo treatments, dropping off food and other things to support you; when you have dementia, everyone just disappears.

I’ve always been a sociable person and I’m missing that so much, but I have no idea how or where to start. Any ideas?

Students navigate campus atmosphere, social changes to find connection

– Left By Friends

Dear Friends: People sometimes don’t know what to do or say when confronted with illness, but that’s no excuse for your friends’ behavior and I’m sorry. The Alzheimer’s Association (alz.org) has a wealth of resources for people with dementia, including support groups, both online and in-person. Being able to talk with others about what you’re experiencing and feeling will help with isolation.

This also might be a time for you to explore new volunteer opportunities or social groups that have nothing to do with dementia, depending on your care plan and abilities. You are a person who is worthy of connection, with a wealth of experiences and knowledge from which others can benefit. Your company would be welcomed at a senior center, a local outing group or an organization that aligns with your interests and values. If you have anxiety about navigating these spaces with dementia, or need accommodation in order to feel safe, please don’t hesitate to reach out in advance and talk to a group leader about how you can participate most comfortably.

Eric is surprised that his fellow lawyers quit associating with him.

He likely ought not to be.

I don't think it's that people don't know what to say or do.  I think that people fail to appreciate that workplace social contacts are, to a very high degree, extremely casual or even business contacts, and that once the professional is not employed, at least in teh law, the value of that person to others in the law is gone.

In other words, this doesn't surprise me a bit. 

**I'd note that I feel the same way about men who weren't in the service, but who worked a blue collar or agricultural job.  Those employments are levelling in a way, and I've noticed that men of the same generation who were never in the Armed Forces, but worked as roughnecks or came from ranches and farms, are much more accepting generally of other people.

***And, ironically, it also started the country off on the hyper glorification of those who have been in the service.

Last edition:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist 82nd Edition. The This Is Your Economy On Dementia Edition.

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