The Pilot at the Doctor's

I was at the doctor’s office today, and a man in a pilot’s uniform was sitting next to me. He was an elderly gentleman, hearty and strong looking, with a tanned, handsome face. I struck up a conversation with him, and despite his shy and quiet demeanor, there was a kindly something to his face that betokened a life practiced in patience and kindheartedness.

            He turned out to be a co-pilot, and I asked him if he liked his job. He almost smiled, but didn’t as he reflected. “I like flying.” He answered cautiously, “I’ve always liked flying. But it’s different now than it used to be.” He seemed like he would retreat back into his phone, but I was intrigued, and wouldn’t let him.

I pursued my questioning, “How is it different?”

“Just, the attitude towards it, I suppose.”

“More impersonal, maybe?”

“Yes, maybe. All about the bottom line now. And, it used to be special for people when they flew. They got dressed up for it. Now it’s – flipflops.” He said that word like it was a terror rearing its head from the depths of the Inferno. My sympathetic heart quickened and went out to him. He finished by saying, “I still love flying, but the people are different. They treat the pilots differently: more carelessly; so that’s not as enjoyable anymore.”

Nowadays, the attitude toward flying, toward taxiing, toward grocery store clerks, is one of commodity. We have done away with social structures and the result is that everyone is simultaneously elite and a slave. When we are behind the counter, being served, we treat the server like a commodity – a machine. And when we are on the other side, we are treated the same.

Here is a man who soars to the clouds, revels in the wonder and un-owned freedom of the sky, and is a slave in his own cockpit. A slave to attitude, dress, customs – a slave to the lack of civility that mankind deigns to bestow upon him. And he loves people: I could tell. He wants to share the joy of climbing to the blue-white heights with sympathetic, beating hearts! and instead, he is treated with cold indifference and confronted with pajamas, and yoga pants, and ‘flip-flops’. Exupery would deeply pity him.

How can we guard against this? How can we learn to treat each member of humanity with grace, dignity, and respect? This man does not pass many words with his passengers – not now, and probably not even much in the past. But he has still noticed a difference of attitude: he specified it as “dress”. People used to get dressed up to fly. Think about that! To don one’s fine, smart clothes and meet the world with dignity and poise. It’s not asking much, really. Just a tasteful, classy outfit, and other people around you see that you are serious about life, fun, and business – instead of constantly ready to fall asleep all the time. Yet your clothes do not simply reflect you, but the activity you are engaged in. When we garden, we wear appropriate attire; when we go on a first date, we dress accordingly. When we fly wearing only sweatpants and an overlarge sweater, we are indicating that flying is just a sloppy business, and the pilots and flight attendants are insignificant commodities shuttling us to our destinations. Not even decent English lords treated their chauffeurs thusly!

So please, next time you get dressed in the morning, think about what you are saying: about yourself, your activities for the day, and the people with whom you will be. 

It matters.

A Brief Treatise on Fashion

"Clothes make a man. 

Naked people have very little 

or no influence on society. "

                              – Mark Twain

It is the pride and joy of our modern day world to glory in the freedom that woman has attained in her mode of dress. Woman has freed herself from the constraints of free-flowing gowns and thrust herself into the liberty of tight pants. She is now her own person, wondrously indistinguishable from the male sex, and thus able to embrace her true potential.

            Obviously, as I am sure you can tell from my tone, I disagree. It’s not that I disapprove of pants: I do in fact sustain an intimate relationship with jeans, which were first sown in heaven, if we are to believe the ancient legends. 

However, I can not and will not assert that our mode of dress heightens the dignity of woman in any way.

            When we take a look at the ancient modes of dress, we find that both men and women wore tunics. Pants were a development that did not take place in the western world until around the 14^th century, at which time our ancestors decided that pants were a good idea for men, but not necessarily for women. Why was that? Probably because women did not wish to attire themselves in something that was actually, at the time, pretty ugly.   

Trousers were certainly not as attractive as a dress. It wasn’t until the late eighteen hundreds that men’s pants became, consistently, the loose trousers we have now.

       

Women wore dresses not because they were a slave to fashion or convention, but because it was generally accepted that dresses were the most flattering attire, and since women are the most beautiful of God’s creatures, it stands to reason that they be clad in the most beautiful of clothing.

   

That which is beautiful is hidden behind a veil. The woman’s body is the most beautiful in all creation, and in reverence for that beauty it is veiled behind beautiful, flattering folds of fabric.

            

Throughout history, women’s clothes have taken on different forms: 

Some universally and agelessly beautiful,  

some debatable,  

and some downright ugly.     

For certainly, it is not true that dresses were always the prime example of beautiful fashion. Take France in the 18th century. Get a load of that hair! And I am certainly not arguing that corsets should be brought back into fashion. Taste and moderation should be practiced in everything - even dresses!

However, it is certainly true that there are fashions of dresses and skirts which are, and have been, extremely flattering for many years. Yet, we seem to have a paranoid fear of being forced back into skirts - as if they were somehow unwomanly and unflattering. I know that I grew up in mortal dread of the jean jumper, afraid of appearing frumpy and too casual. Yet, nowadays, we seem to have no problem being frumpy in society so long as it is with the liberty of pants, and is in fashion.
 
Just remember: just because it's in fashion, doesn't mean it's tasteful - or attractive. (See 18th century French Fashion above)

Pants are great, comfy, and can be pulled off with definite flair,  but don't write off dresses. After all, when all's said and done, all pros and cons considered, dresses are more attractive than pants any day! You are woman, and you are beautiful.