Writing Without Sweatpants

How I learned to be my own boss, complete with a company dress code

Way back when, I had a boyfriend who could only write if he was wearing a collared shirt, a tie, and well-pressed trousers. This was back in prehistoric times, when I was a fresh-faced youngster getting started in journalism. My wardrobe at that time was motley. I had a lot of jeans; a lot of odd pieces I had sourced at the local Goodwill; a few granny dresses; and an oversupply of vintage sequined sweaters. I might have owned a dress (or maybe I didn’t), and I certainly didn’t own anything that could have passed muster as business attire.

It might be hard to tell in this photo, but this is one of my stable of sequined sweaters…moths got this one, alas. Photo by Gaspar Tringale

I must have owned a dozen of these beauties. Where are they now???

At the time, my boyfriend and I worked for an alternative newsweekly in Portland, Oregon. He wrote about business, and I covered whatever thrilling bits and bobs caught my attention. He was diligent; I was passionate and a little undisciplined. I viewed his shirt-and-tie ritual as a little weird, slightly kinky and bondage-y and uptight. Unlike him, I wrote on the fly, wherever I found a flat surface and a pen, in whatever messy getup I had on. I didn’t have any rituals that marked the difference between ordinary time and work time; it was one slippery slide. I definitely didn’t dress for work, and wouldn’t have quite known what that would have even looked like.