One of the guys at the bus stop was on the cutting edge of all the fads.
He was usually the very first guy to do the new thing. He had a couple older sisters, so I think he was getting his info from them. Beyond informing him, they encouraged him to adopt the next big thing.
The first I remember was the Member’s Only Jacket. All the guys seemed to be getting them. They came in just a few different colors, but everyone knew that black was the toughest look. One by one, my friends convinced their parents to get them a jacket. Some ended up with the burgundy while one poor guy got the teal one. I finally was able to secure a nice black jacket, but it was a knockoff. It was missing that little patch under the single front breast pocket that said “Member’s Only.” I guess I wasn’t an official member.
After the jackets, guys started to grow out this little rat tail in the back of their hair. This was early to mid eighties, so we were all a little shaggy, but not too bad. But instead of growing all of the hair out, boys were just growing out an inch wide strip in the center of the back of their hair. There was no standard so sometimes it was two inches wide which made it look fat. Sometimes it was a half inch which was a little thin. It was a new look to me and I wasn’t sure what to make of it. My memory is fuzzy, but I seem to recall mentioning it to my mom and having her let me know that I wouldn’t be participating. It was an easy out. I could avoid a look I didn’t like, but might be pressured into getting by blaming it on my mom. That’s a win. “Yeah, I’d really like a horrible haircut so I can be like you, but you know parents.”
The third in this trifecta of misguided fashion sense was the pierced ear. Now back in my day (to be heard in the oldest grandpa voice imaginable), you had to be very selective about this ear piercing business. For males, a pierced right ear was for “fags”. No males were piercing both ears, at least not in Flint. If you were going for cool, it was the left ear alone. A tiny hoop was acceptable as was a small diamond stud. My fashion forward friend met me at the corner and couldn’t resist showing his new adornment. A tiny gold hoop ring was fastened through the swollen, red, infected earlobe of his left ear. He couldn’t have been more proud. I suggested a tetanus shot. The night before, his sister used the tried and true method of a lighter to disinfect a sewing needle, an ice cube to numb the lobe and a potato for the back side of the ear. I’m glad I wasn’t there to see it. I’m sure it went badly.
It didn’t take long for the majority of the guys at the bus stop to have this trifecta of junior high style: rat tails, pierced left ears and member’s only jackets for everyone. I had the jacket, blamed my mom for the hair and boldly proclaimed my choice to pass on becoming an aspiring cosmetologist’s guinea pig.
It was about then that I started to realize that most people want you to be just like them. They don’t want different. Different scares people. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s because it requires them to ask themselves why it is they are doing what they are doing. Maybe they believe their way is right and your doing it differently makes them doubt themselves. After all, life is easier just doing what you’re told and following the guy in front of you. Plus, you don’t have to listen to everyone ridicule you for being so different.
Or you could be who God made you to be.
Joel Stiff's Adventure 