My Polo Shirts Give Me Away

I am known in certain circles as a trendsetter. I brought wool socks to Florida. I single-handedly popularized safari hats for everyday wear, and I have extended the appeal of flannel shirts well beyond their normal life span.

Still, it was a small surprise when, speaking with a new Danish friend recently, I learned the full extent of my otherness.

"I suppose people here can tell I'm not Scandinavian pretty quickly," I admitted, considering my outgoing personality and general doofiness on a bicycle.
"Yes," she said. "It's mostly the Polo shirts."

Really? Polo shirts? Since when are Polo shirts not cool?

Okay, you see, trend-setting status aside, the style genre I am generally most comfortable with would fit somewhere in the mid 1990s. I'm talking preppie GAP-cum-wannabe grunge. I like plaid. I like Army/Navy stuff. I like layering long-sleeve shirts under skater t-shirts. I like Doc Martins.

This look is the antithesis of now. Particularly now in Scandinavia. The look here is (and I am surprised to find, has been for some time) skinny jeans. Aptly named because you do need to be skinny to look good in them. Lacking that, there is even a revival of what I'm hoping is an "ironic" tight-roll. Exhibit A:



Those socks and shoes are totally rad, too, apparently. (In my world, grunge rockers and riot grrls beat the crap out of dudes like this.)

So, fine. Scandinavia is all big scarves and long sweaters and leggings and leg warmers. So what? I rocked the eighties once already. I think once is enough. I'm just going to stay right here in my boot-cut GAP classics until they come back around again. By my calculations, it could be any day now.