For the last month or two, he said, it has been fashionable to cut out the knees of pants.
“I made these myself,” he said in his Aussie/Kiwi/Whatever accent, nodding toward his tightroll-ankle, cutout-knee blue jeans.
The maybe-Aussie wore an LA Dodgers baseball cap with the brim kept as straight as the original packaging allowed. He even kept the stickers on the hat to tell size, brand and reflectivity, as a good hat should.
His hair was brown and flowing. His beard was trimmed and delightful.
And he sat on the #73 bus with 1980s-tightrolled blue jeans with the knees physically cut out with scissors.
“Yeah, it’s a thing,” said the second man I had seen that day with cut-out fashion knees.
1. Burn the world.
2. Let me tell you about my hair.
Over the last week, “Christ-Mas” to the believers, I have engaged in rituals including but not limited to bringing my girlfriend to spend the “Holi-Day” with my parents and sister.
During said “Holi-Day,” certain things were revealed.
Certain horrible things.
And certain horrible photos of certain horrible things involving my hair in the early 1990s.
And these certain horrible photos of certain horrible things involved… business in front.
And party in… oh god I am so sorry.
Party in back.
I had a mullet.
Oh god.
Beyond the fact that if you were of a certain age in Rockford, Illinois, in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, your fashion North Star was more Guns ‘N’ Roses than Milan catwalks, my point is that who am I to judge?
Who am I to judge this man who cut two large holes out of his new pants so he can show off what I can only presume is called “knee cleavage”?
“You can buy them like this, but I made these,” he said.
Not going to judge.
“It’s been a thing for the last month or two,” he said. “It’s a thing.”
Not going to judge.
“It’s been a little cold lately,” he said as he rode the bus with large, self-inflicted holes in his pants in late December.
Not. Going. To. Judge.
So we all make stupid mistakes in our lives, particularly ones involving fashion. I had an embarrassing hairstyle when I was 14. At least two grown men I saw on Dec. 27, 2015, were riding public transit with kneeless trousers. Live and let live, I say.
But I say it with pants intact from waist to cuff.
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A bus full of dudebro teenagers