BLATHER REVIEW

Hats

What ever happened to hats?

During the winter, when I was riding the bus because gawd-knows-what was wrong with my truck, a young lady (who looked like someone I'd never intentionally strike up a conversation with) grinned at me from across the bus and changed seats just to get close enough to tell me that she liked my hat.

(It's a jungle-camouflage hunting cap with loops on the crown for holding rounds of buck-shot.)

"Everyone today who even bothers to wear a hat wears some kinda baseball cap-style hat. It's so cool to see something else!" she swooned.

When I was in basic training we called the dress uniform hat the "bus driver hat". (You ladies don't want to know what we called that soft diner's-short-order-cook type thingy...)

But bus drivers don't wear hats anymore.
Neither do cops.
Neither do short order cooks.

It used to be that when you wore a uniform (i.e. worked a job), you wore an appropriate cap. Even the ice cream truck driver wore a c-cap!

And, O.T., what's with these ice cream trucks these days, anyway? It used to be that you ran up to the truck and the hatted man would pull levers and push buttons and produce a soft-cone of your favorite flavor, and nowadays they just reach into the freezer bin and pull out a wrapped piece of crap.
Oh, sure, it looks pretty. But, what is this? It's not an ice cream truck! It's just a Circus Clown's freezer case on wheels.

Mailmen don't wear hats anymore, either. Am I just becoming too old fashioned or wouldn't we all like that stranger walking on our property and up to our front door to be wearing an official hat if only as a sign that he's here on officially welcomed business?

Waitresses don't even wear tiarras anymore. I want my waitress in a pink dress with a white apron and crown. I don't want this tie-dyed jeans with the employee jersey half-tucked in crap anymore. I want my waitress!

Okay, hon', I know you like your "space". But, when you're doing your job you're in nothing less than my space. I give eight hours (at least) to my employer. Please do the same for yours. Truely.

My grandfather wore a hat everywhere he went and took it off whenever he stepped indoors. That's how we learned to do it back then when people seemed to have respect for some semblence of social protocol.

*sigh*

Perhaps we've already passed the point where we're just too darned convinced that donning a simple frickin' hat is too demanding on us. Has simple respect and a sense of duty toward each other long been poo-poo'd onto the compost heap of history? If we don't honor our duty to serve when we work, then what are we to honor? Ourselves?

If so then I fear that something a whole lot more valuable than hats has slipped through our fingers. Is it all too late to remember that space and propriety go hand in hand? That it's appropriate that my space ends where your expectations of me begin?

Hats, my friends.

And skirts. Ladies in skirts! (Believe me, gals, every body type looks best in a skirt!)

Duty now for the future; Bring back hats!

...and skirts!

They're healthy and nutritious!

Posted by Tuning Spork at July 23, 2004 11:23 PM