Thursday 24 August 2023
Times Change
Recently Mrs H and I were chatting about elderly folk who look like our parents in the way they dress. We still see a few of them around – fading links with another age.
Old men with trousers of a rather generous cut, shirts with collars and possibly a tie, leather shoes and maybe a blazer or a beige jacket. Elderly ladies with long pleated skirts, sensible shoes, blouse and cardigan.
We saw an old couple yesterday, reading while seated on a bench in the seaside sun. They could almost have been my parents but must have been younger by at least ten years. Unlike my parents, they could not have lived through the war as adults, but it could be said that they were from the same generation. Nineteen forties just about shading into the fifties.
Later we saw a man dressed as a woman in mini-skirt, high-heeled shoes, frilly top and handbag. He had a camera on a small tripod which he was using to take photos of himself in various careless poses. Mrs H said his glances suggested he was trying to attract attention.
Times change.
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7 comments:
"his glances suggested he was trying to attract attention."
Yes, that's what so much of their alphabet soup is all about. Look at me, I'm different; look at me, I'm special; look at me, I'm a victim; above all, look at me,
Jannie - that's it, "look at me" is what the behaviour says loudly and clearly. We see climate clown behaviour giving out a similar message - "look at me being virtuous".
Appropriate dress codes for the elderly are really interesting, especially as one gets older. There are lots of wealthy women in our village who dress as they did in their youth. Blonde hair expensively cut, often with a fringe. A vaguely hippyish casual look, with cheesecloth and jeans and lots of bangles and beads. Being skinny is really important. Yet some of them are pushing 80.
The poorer women still go for the shapeless floral dress that grannies have worn in the summer since the 1950s.
It's like two different species.
I can't sympathise with anyone who wears a tie by choice. Loathsome bloody things.
With one exception: if I wished to be properly dressed for a wedding - topper and tails - I'd wear a tie for that.
Americans wear DJs for weddings. Uurgh.
Sam - we see something like that in Sidmouth although it isn't easy to distinguish between wealthy and not so wealthy. Don't see it at home though.
dearieme - it's funerals only for me. We once knew a chap who would wear a tie on a walk in the Derbyshire hills. He'd wear the usual walking gear like everyone else plus shirt and tie under his waterproof walking jacket.
On dress codes for those of riper years.
I think people happen upon an age or era that suits them and there they stay while time and fashion waits for no one.
Yes, we have a few of those elegant but ageing ladies around here, would have got to the big 3 0 around the 1970s and there they stayed.
djc - I wonder how many younger people today will be happy to keep their tattoos for decades?
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