I have a habit/hobby/obsession of rejecting fashion. If more than 50% of the population does it - there’s gotta be something wrong, right? The evils of society - sneakers, popular music, short hair, MySpace layouts, Windows, World of Warcraft, and of course to top it off with the ultimate manifestation of solidarity: Jeans.

Jeans are sickly widespread. By that I mean 80% of the population around you is probably wearing Jeans right now (unless you’re at the office most likely, but possibly even then.) Seriously, next time you’re sitting somewhere, just do a little count of how many people around you are not wearing Jeans. You’d be amazed.

And so, for possibly even two years (I can’t remember), I wore no jeans at all whatsoever. None. Interesting part is, nobody actually noticed until I told them. “So you don’t have any Jeans?” - “Nope.”

There is, however, a certain level of conformism I sort of owe to society. I could go about rejecting standards when they’re more common and such, but otherwise, no go. And I, being male, faced a certain problem when it came to Jeans alternatives.

There simply are almost no Jeans alternatives for men. Sure, you have corduroy, and that stuff they have all over the place, suit pants, surfer pants (you won’t see me wearing those), ordinary old-man pants and of course kilts. Kilts aren’t very widespread in northern Europe, so I figured I’m not going to wear any. Suit pants and ordinary old-man pants aren’t really my taste, and surfer pants are fucking disgusting. In other words, I’m kind of left with corduroy and that generic undefinable stuff they use.

I could cross over and start wearing skirts, of course, but as I said, there is a certain level of conformity I owe to society. So as much as I do want to wear skirts and make-up (honestly), I simply can’t. Not a good idea in job interviews, school environments and around your parents

Fine! You got me! I surrender, society! You know what, you got me. You win, majority. I’m willing to buy Jeans, and wear them with pride.

And so, on the 3rd of June I went to the nearest mall to get myself some Jeans, under three restrictions. They must not be blue-blue, faded blue is good enough, really dark blue, fine. Additionally, the waistline must be sane and shouldn’t cause any problems for a person actually walking in them. Then lastly, they must not cost over 300 Danish Kroner (~ US$53).

I, wearing black pants and a buttoned shirt, together with a fellow community member, Simon, who was wearing surfer pants and a glaring pink hoodie that could frighten small children made our way through the dungeon of stores at Field’s on an open Sunday.

It became very obvious how much of a misfit I actually was. Although I had three whole years to adjust to life in the urban jungle, Simon was way ahead of me in terms of cultural understanding and social behavior. Switching off the analytical mind of his in exchange for the more socially acceptable mask of politeness. The funny part is, he had only moved to the city two weeks earlier. Some people just have it in them.

At H&M, the IKEA of clothes, I couldn’t find anything even remotely reassembling what I was looking for. The Mini-Magasin store did in fact have an interesting pair, but for 900 Kroner (~ US$161), they were doomed to stay where they were for a very long time if it depended on me. Eventually, I lost track of where we were heading, and we had reached a section neither of us knew. In fact, I doubt it was even mapped. And to think Field’s looks like a simple place from the outside. Like two explorers, finding natives far away where no white man had gone before, we found ourselves surrounded by locals carrying bags embedded with various logos. “It’s hard to find clothes when your style is based on irony.” He said, but it’s even harder to find clothes when you have no idea where you are or where you might be heading.

“Where are we?” Neither of us knew. Eventually, a lucky turn in the path revealed the familiar sight of the stairs and Jack & Jones. At last, mapped territory.

I remember looking for non-Jeans pants in Jack & Jones that one time. Of course, to no avail. They simply did not have that item. It was like walking into a Chinese restaurant seeking to buy condoms. It is just not going to work out. And so, looking through the stacks of Jeans, I found myself a faded gray pair. The waistline made sense, and the size was good enough. For 200 Kroner (~ US$35), I could afford them. I put them on, looked okay, good enough.

So there you have it, society. I’m wearing Jeans. But, hey, at least I haven’t cut my hair yet, and yes, I still want to wear make-up. Maybe I’ll make a statement of going to prom wearing a dress. Although in order to do that and be excused, it might be better to at least act dangerously drunk, high, or temporarily insane.

After repetitive prodding from different people, I sort of realized that I really needed new shoes.

Just to sort of show you what I had at the time I made that decision:

This pair served me for perhaps 18 months. I found it lying around, not sure what was its purpose in its miserable life, I took it and wore it, mainly because it was the middle of June, and walking around in a pair of shoes - not quite shoes rather should I say army boots - was quite unpleasant even in Denmark. I think it got so bad that at a certain point even hobos would stop by to say: “dude, you really need new shoes.” (Metaphorically of course.)

My “as long as it sort of covers your body, you don’t need to buy a new one”-policy was simply showing its darker sides.

So one fine day. Two days ago, as a matter fact, the thought striked me to buy new shoes. So quickly, before my logic circuit kicked in, I dragged myself to a shoe store that was clearly aimed at people with women troubles as their slogan went “Chicks Love Shoes.” Right on!

It didn’t take me long to decide between “the lesser of two evils”, try it on, try a different size on, and just see what’s going on. My logic circuit was sort of coming back to life, and I realized that it would make much more sense if I’d went to one of two more stores and check out what they have and although I did find a pair I liked, I could always come back and take them anyway.

So I did a quick check, and saw that I couldn’t really find much that suited my taste. Mostly because of this brand new icky color they have on the soles usually - extremely annoying.

At some point a nice clerk told me (though nicely) “get the fuck out of the store I wanna go home already it’s fucking Friday afternoon” - and so I did.

When I went back to the old store, it was closed. So I just came back and bought that pair of shoes.

An uncomfortable price of 500 DKK - there goes my RAM extension. I’m gonna have to stick to only 256mb RAM.. but of course, there’s always a friendly ad to come to my rescue “chicks love shoes”, I don’t think they love RAM though. Too bad.

Here’s the new pair:

Sexy, nice, smooth, and still sort of elegant.

The relationship I had with my older shoes was amazing though. They were so beaten up that they actually had exactly the shape of my feet. I also had a Tatami-style thing going on with them: I didn’t tie them almost at all at a certain point, I’d just put my feet in and everything will sort of “work out by itself”.

But hey, at least I look like a stylish hobo now..