Sweatpants Swagger

(image taken from Svpply)

(image taken from Yoox)

Dangling from the monkey bars, primary color metal baking in the autumn sun, our arms thin as sticks with knob-elbows, or carousing between playground and baseball diamond and conifer tree clump, a sea of braids and overalls and scrunchies, we viciously taunted the sweat pants crew, those unfortunate few, mostly boys, that wore the flimsy cotton comforts as pants at school. Crudely, these particular students were lumped into a vastly inferior social strata, in the realm of paste-eaters and kids knocked out first in dodge ball. Elementary etiquette is fledgling and primal, delicately balancing between the horrific and the profound with regard to human nature and truth. My friends and I tended to move and speak and act as one, strength in numbers, a trend that continued through middle school and, thankfully, dispersed after further physical and mental development. Though not universally, we could tend towards the cruel, some of us more vocally and expertly than others. 

That sweatpants were selected to demean and belittle was, arguably, rather arbitrary, considering other popular styles donned by the tyrants included supremely wide-legged skater pants, laughable and pathetic since no one had ever mounted a board. An, again almost subliminal, prey or be preyed upon sort of philosophy. Socially and stylistically, I am now more refined. My sensibilities are kinder and less myopic, less sculpted by the sensibilities of my immediate peers in my environment. I am my own woman, I wear what I would prefer, behave as I wish, and am confident enough in myself and my relationships to not be terribly concerned about the consequences, especially for anything superficial, like general appearance. I would not, and do not intend to, still mock those who indulge in the gentle touch of those loose, untailored lounge pants. 

While I also, as I repeatedly state, totally understand the cyclic and repetitive nature of various fashion trends, I cannot help but find the recent surge of high-end, luxury designer sweatpants bizarre, and, as fate often is, ironic. There is status bottled water, designer adhesive bandages and knit beanie caps, so these expensive sweatpants should not be surprising. Nevertheless, as I work to subtly influence the wardrobe of my filmmaker, devolving to sweatpants like a small child is not a lesson I plan to instill.