The Clothes Make the Daniels

Normally, when I get Daniel dressed in the morning, we experience recurrent inter-generational warfare around what exactly he will wear for the day. I have this uptight idea that children should dress formally for school, and adults, at least if they work in an office, should dress formally for work. He generally insists on wearing jeans or sweat-pants. I used to think that jeans were the second-worst choice for school attire, and sweat-pants were rock-bottom, in spite of the latest trends among the Russian Mafia. Of course, once Daniel acquired faux army fatigue-patterned pants, sweat pants became innocuous by contrast; American parents don't worry about Odessa gang-wars, but Kandahar is quite another matter.

In any case, we normally fight over whether he'll look ready for athletics or ready for academics, but today, Daniel was way ahead of me in fashion and formality. He made it clear he wanted to wear black pants and a button-down - yes, button-down - white shirt. I am infamous for my black-pants-and-white-shirt routine; people who don't know me better might take me for a Hasid or a Shia seminarian. And on Sunday, I often try to wear a tie, and sometimes also a jacket. And Daniel was methodically gathering each of these accouterments for a tightly integrated, very spiffy wardrobe. In fact, this is what I said:

"I really want to dress like you. " Looking at my black shoes, contrasted (pitifully, for me, I would say) against his also-black-but-fashing-red-on-impact Darth Vader shoes, he reflected, "Too bad I don't have those shoes. "

He asked specifically for a blue jacket that he saw hanging in his closet. He examined it, and found that the inner lining was red. He asked whether any of my jackets had the same lining. Unfortunately, somehow none do.

blue jacket with red lining - do I hav

e the same?

Contemplating a jacket and/or tie, he asked, "Are you gonna wear that, are you just gonna wear that white shirt."

He also discussed how he associates white shirts with Easter, and particularly appreciates the Paschal holiday because he gets to wear his "Easter" shirt.

Likes Pascha because of the white shirt - one of his favorite things about it.

In the end, he accompanied me, Ian, and Madeleine to Boston - the big city - for church, wearing black pants, a white shirt, a white-on-blue tie with an elaborate pattern, his Sunday-best Darth Vader black shoes, and the celebrated blue jacket with the red inner-lining. He also brought two other ties, to keep his options open, and showed his touring habadashery to people during our outing. I wore black pants, an Easter-white shirt, a tie (only one), black shoes, and a jacket. No red inner-lining, no flashing Darth Vader features to the shoes, but so be it. We looked wonderfully alike, and I was so happy, I took a million pictures of him in his glory, and he squinted his photogenic trademark smile for each one.

As far as I know, nobody has ever consciously aspired to dress like me before. And certainly, nobody has ever coordinated as closely as possible, to maximize the match in look-and-feel.

As funny as the whole thing may seem, it's also extremely moving, and flattering. Daniel is certainly a chip off the old block, and the old block is deeply honored.

(December 18, 2011)