Bigger Deal

“It was red and yellow and green and brown and blue”

When we’re at a European Poker Tour  event, it’s all too easy to spend the entire time inside the hotel. Your room is there, the tournament is there, the restaurant(s) and bar are there. After the long (and odd) hours, you find yourself thinking that a sandwich and TV in the room, or a pint and a natter at the bar sound like a hell of an idea.

But I’ve made a promise to myself to get out and see when I’m at these wonderful host cities, so yesterday I treated myself to a walk into Copenhagen city center. I didn’t have much time before the EPT Live  broadcast started, but even 90 minutes of feeling Copenhagen’s cobblestones under my shoes and its startlingly fresh air in my lungs would be time well spent.

It was out on that walk that I got to thinking about the clothes I was wearing. One doesn’t think about one’s clothes much. At least, this one doesn’t. I have relatively few clothes (and always seem to be taking a bag of things to Oxfam or Goodwill). So I can often recall the source of each article of clothing that I’m wearing, and…

The scarf around my neck came from Amsterdam. Lisa and I were there on a holiday weekend and I was getting cold. It seemed that everybody else was wearing a scarf, so I said, “Let’s get me one.” I don’t think I’d ever owned (or wore) a scarf before, but when in Amsterdam… [1] We found a wonderful scarf store on Leidsestraat and in fact ended up buying scarves for both sons and my parents as Christmas gifts. Younger son, John, whose clothing taste runs more, ah, colorful than mine, originally approved the blue and tan pattern that I’d gotten for myself. But when he saw the one that we’d gotten him, he said “Lee, obviously they had a huge selection. You should have gone balls to the wall.” For me, the blue and tan pattern was.

My gloves are some of the most personal and special of any article of clothing I own. My father-in-law, Selby Haupet, passed away recently. Selby was many things to many people, but what he gave me was invaluable: credibility. When Lisa and I first got married in 1997, she had two sons. Their father had basically abandoned the family seven years prior, and Selby was one of the few consistent male influences in their lives. Lisa’s older son, David, particularly counted on Selby as a father figure. When I first came onto the scene, David naturally rebelled against my presence. But Selby was welcoming and warm to me from the start. David saw that, and I know Selby knew David was watching him. Selby’s unquestioning acceptance of me into the family surely sent David a strong message and for that, I will be forever indebted to the man. Of course, David and I had to work out our own relationship, and we’ve done that in fine fashion, I think. But without Selby, the job would have been that much more difficult. Anyway, when Selby died, his wife of over half a century, Liz, asked me what of his I wanted. There was really nothing I cared for until I came across a pair of butter-soft leather driving gloves that fit me like, well, a glove. They are warm on the inside, beautiful on the outside, and I think of my father-in-law when I wear them. Quite a gift, that.

My shirt, well, it’s a PokerStars  logo polo shirt. That’s been covered elsewhere.

T-shirt. Came in a three-pack from Marks & Spencer. I recall a (apocryphal?) story that when Margaret Thatcher became the prime minister of England, the reporters asked her where she bought her underwear – presumably this was a test of her attachment to the common people. “Marks & Spencer,” she replied, “Doesn’t everybody?” Once you own underclothes from M&S, you’re true member of British society.

Unlike Lady Thatcher, my underwear wasn’t purchased at M&S. I got ‘em at the Wal-Mart in Jefferson, North Carolina. It’s in the county where my grandparents and their parents and their parents were raised. Everybody feared that the Wal-Mart would kill off downtown West Jefferson as it has in so many towns. New York Times writer Liz Smith even wrote an article mourning the passing of the hardware store in West Jefferson and the coming of Wal-Mart. To my delight (and I’m sure Ms. Smith’s as well), West Jefferson has reinvented itself as a golf, fishing, and general seclusion vacation destination for the flatlanders from Raleigh and Charlotte. So now there’s an outfitter store selling Columbia and North Face in the old hardware building, and you can even buy a cappuccino along Jefferson Street (though Starbucks hasn’t found us yet). The Wal-Mart, it’s out there on the bypass, open 24/7 and the parking lot is always full. It’s about as good a compromise as we could have hoped for.

My hat is a gray wool watch cap, sort of in the Jacques Cousteau mold. Only I doubt Captain Cousteau bought his trademark red caps at flea markets in Lille, France. Lisa and I were visiting David in his temporary home where he was teaching English. I, of course, neglected to pack a hat for the trip. This fit beautifully, cost something like five Euros, and keeps my scalp and ears warm.

I got the jeans – stylish designer jeans – in Dortmund, Germany last year. I needed a nice pair and stumbled across a jeans store in Dortmund’s main shopping district. Unfortunately, the dressing room in the store didn’t have a mirror, so I had to step out into the store to get a look at the pants on me. I tried on one pair, then came back to review another pair with an inch longer inseam. A woman (my age) and her daughter had been nearby for both viewings (apparently). The woman said something to her daughter, who told me perfect English: “She thinks the longer leg is better. I agree.” As did the shop lady standing by. With that unanimous vote on the longer leg, I made my purchase in full confidence that I wouldn’t be wearing high-water pants around Dortmund or elsewhere.

The socks are Thorlos. Thorlos are the Volvo of socks. They are not stylish or fashionable. But if you want a sock that will keep your feet comfortable for hours at a time – even hiking up mountains – you can’t beat Thorlos. My mom, she buys them whenever they’re on sale and sends them to me. She has a (not altogether incorrect) theory that I probably wear my socks until they have holes in them. Because of mom, I always have a drawer full of warm and comfortable socks.

My shoes are equally, ah, sturdy. They’re black Eccos that I bought on Kensington High Street in London. I’d somehow got a brown pair in San Jose a couple of years ago and discovered that they were good looking, could be worn with a wide variety of clothes, and were Gor-Tex lined – a key feature in the northwest of England. When I came across a similar black pair in London I snapped them up. They’ve walked over a thousand miles and haven’t let me down yet.

And with that, we come to the topcoat, one of my newer acquisitions. For ten years, I’d had a very gray trench coat. It definitely did the job – kept me warm and dry, even in places like the Isle of Man and foggy London. But made me look (and I quote Lisa here) “frumpy”. Heaven forbid I should look frumpy, so I threw the Territory Ahead catalog at her. “Here, your mom gave me a gift certificate to them some time ago. I’ve been dreaming about what I might order, but here’s your chance to have some input.” Lisa paged through it, and then, with little hesitation, parked her finger on a long duster. “That one – in the olive green.” And so it was. When it arrived in the mail, I knew it was the coat. It’s got just enough style to go over a suit without looking silly. But it’s funky enough to look good over jeans and it’s warm and waterproof and has big pockets. Recently, Mad Harper, the press queen of the EPT, said to me en passant, “Nice coat, Lee – I like that.” So me and Joseph – we’re pretty damn proud of our coats.

There are decorator crabs in the Pacific Ocean that have what amounts to Velcro covering their shells. They spend their lives picking bits of detritus off the ocean floor and attaching it to themselves. I guess in some ways we’re like decorator crabs – we pick up pieces here and there and it becomes part of our outfit. That helps make each of us who we are and gives us a sense of individuality.

Next time you’re out and about, think about your clothes, and the path you had to follow to end up with each piece on you. I bet you get a surprise – and a smile – somewhere in there.

“And scarlet and black and ochre and peach and ruby and olive and violet and fawn”

 [1] Of course, the phrase “When in Amsterdam…” usually has other endings, but that’s a story for a different time. Go Back