I am not making this up.
When I retired from The Sun, many moons ago, I stuck all of my work clothes in a closet and forgot about them.
Because, you know, I was retired and stuff.
Who needs black tie shoes on First Mag Sundays? And those dress slacks? A bad look at Walmart. Dark suits? Maybe hang on to one in case of funerals.
Years passed in blissful retirement. And thus it came to pass that, one day, I was invited to a fancy dance party.
So I pulled my long neglected shiny black going-to-work shoes out of the closet and lashed them to my feet.
For old times sake.
It was a very nice affair. And I was doing my duty on the dance floor when my black going-to-work shoes literally disintegrate around my feet.
Soles akimbo everywhere.
Having gamely held the shoes together for so long, the glue slowly dried out and gave up the ghost in that airless closet.
I glided outa the building on stockinged feet.
I only bring this up because, many more moons later, I resolved to clean out my closets.
Get rid of those LL Bean pants that haven’t kept up with my waist line, let alone the times.
Thin out the tropical shirts I haven’t worn since Jimmy Buffet fell off that stage in Australia.
Long story short (who am I kidding) I began in my son’s old room. I’d been stashing stuff away in his closet since Andrew departed for San Francisco.
This madras shirt? A keeper.
That sweat stained Bogart suit? Hell, I don’t even own a cork-pulling parakeet.
And then I found them. Hanging there in the dark.
Like lurking boa constrictors.
Ties. Lots of ties.
Hell, there must have been 30 of ‘em.
My Gator tie. My bicycle tie. My Election Day tie. My French horn tie.
My lizard tie. (Don’t ask.)
What to do?
Toss ‘em of course. That’s what I came in for, right?
Not so fast.
Those ties meant something to me once upon a time. I wore one nearly every day for most of my nearly 40 years in the bidness.
And never mind that I barely remember how to tie the damned things anymore.
The last funeral I attended I stood in front of a mirror for an eternity waiting for my tie tying muscle memory to kick in.
What to do?
Maybe roll them up, one by one. To be kept in reserve lest there be a sudden need for lots (and lots) of tourniquets.
Of use them as headbands. Easy Rider-style.
Ah, but then I’d have to trade in my road bike for a Harley.
Donate them to the world renowned Doctors Without Ties organization?
Or sell ‘em on EBay? Hell, that’s a lot of really good cheap polyester to simply toss.
But something makes me hesitate. An almost forgotten memory tucked way in the back of my cranial CPU.
It was 1976 and I had just left my job at the Ft. Lauderdale Sun Sentinel to be higher ed reporter for The Sun.
We were still in the old building downtown. And at that time The Sun was hosting an on-site UF journalism class.
We were giving J School students hands-on newspaper experience before loosing them on the world.
I was pounding away on a story when Jon Roosenraad interrupted me. Jon had been one of my J School profs back in the day. And now he taught the class at The Sun.
“Cunningham, I’m glad you’re here,” he growled, albeit grudgingly.
Woah! A complement. From a hard nosed prof at that.
“Why’s that?” I asked. Expecting him to gush over my world-changing reportage.
“I keep telling these kids that they have to dress the part if they want to make it in this profession,” he said.
“And you’re the only one in the newsroom who wears a tie every day.”
Listen, you gotta take your complements where you can get ‘em.
Anyway, it hasn’t been all that long ago that we lost Jon.
And I know I ought to toss the ties.
But maybe I’ll await the inevitable day a plane crashes in our neighborhood.
When I’ll race out the front door. Arms full of rolled-up cheap polyester.
And yell: “Fear not! I got the tournaquets!”
FreeGNV 