Man makes the clothes then clothes make the man

The summer of 1928 was extraordinarily hot. As July melted into August, young Italian men took to appearing in the streets of Rome without their suit jackets. They attempted to make up for this breach in decorum by tucking brightly colored silk handkerchiefs into their shirt pockets, and some stores even sold special shirts with wide rolled collars, designed specifically to be worn without a coat.

Where these coatless men got into trouble was when they tried to step aboard a streetcar because, in Rome in 1928, it was against the law for a man without a coat to take public transportation. Conductors -- then as now bastions of propriety -- would castigate the men and bar them from riding. Sometimes the police became involved.

Just one battle in a very long war between formality and casualness, the latest skirmish of which took place last Wednesday in Chicago when the always-natty Cook County Commissioner William Beavers publicly upbraided juvenile detention expert Earl Dunlap for showing up at a meeting in a white polo shirt and dark Dockers pants.

"Do you own a suit?" mocked Beavers, telling Dunlap he's "supposed to be a role model." Dunlap held his ground. "I've got bigger fish to fry," he later told reporters.

Where to begin? Aesthetically, Beavers is correct. His politics might be of the crudest sort (Beavers calling himself "the hog with the big nuts" will stick to him the way "Carthage must be destroyed" stuck to Cato the Elder, though without the same ennobling effect). But Beavers always looks snappy. Dunlap, on the other hand, is a heavy man whose form is not flattered by his X-large short-sleeve shirt.

Culturally, however, Beavers is living in the past. If we wind the clock back to the pre-air-conditioned 1930s, standards of male dress were subject to continual debate -- ministers, tired of losing their flocks to the beach every summer, would announce that God is not offended by men worshipping in their shirtsleeves. In New York, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia had to appeal to the police commissioner to allow officers to shed their heavy uniform coats in summer.

"Shirtsleeves are an American institution," he wrote.

If so, they're one of the few American institutions that are rolling easily toward universal triumph. Over the past decade, casual dress has won out so thoroughly that to even raise the subject of fashion propriety seems antique. The young men riding the elevator with me are invariably dressed in cargo shorts, flip-flops and T-shirts emblazoned with cryptic glyphs. I assume they're punching lines of code into a computer, and not representing defendants in death penalty cases, but that's only a matter of time.

"Your appearance commands respect," Beavers said, in his dressing down of Dunlap and perhaps it is not coincidental that the professions clinging most tightly to traditional male costume -- lawyers, Cook County officials, aging newspaper columnists -- are exactly those professions whose sense of self-respect is most besieged.

Time to get up. Take a shower. You said last night you would. OK, then, at least wash your face. Brush your teeth. Get dressed. Put your clothes on. Look in the drawer. There are clothes in your drawer. Really? Look in the dryer then. What do you want for breakfast? Did you really brush your teeth? Is your toothbrush wet? Comb your hair. Leave your brother alone. I don't care who started it. What do you want for lunch? If you want soup, you need a Thermos, and you've left two at school already. Do you have your homework? Is it in your backpack? Does you teacher accept these papers, crumpled up like this? Wear your coat. Wear a hoodie, then. Don't forget your viola. Don't forget you're going over to Steven's house after school. Don't forget to bring home that permission slip. Good-bye. Have a great day. I love you.

How was school? What did you do? Nothing? Really? Didn't you have an assembly? There's an assembly on the calendar. What do you want for snack? Not cookies, fruit. Not soda, juice. Do your homework before you watch TV. It's not due until Wednesday, but you'd better start it now. Practice your viola. Practice the piano. Time for dinner -- turn off the TV. No, that's what I made. That's what we're having. No, you can't have a burrito instead. Juice or milk. You can pour it yourself, it's right in front of you. No, you can't watch "A Clockwork Orange." When you're 18, that's when. No, you can't be excused. Clear your plate. We'll have dessert later.

You haven't done your homework. You haven't practiced your instrument. You can't watch that show. You need to take a shower. No, you didn't take one yesterday. Brush your teeth. Leave your brother alone. I don't care who started it. Your frog's going to die if you don't take care of him. You can read for 15 minutes, but then I want you to go to bed. It's time to go to bed. Turn the lights out. First thing tomorrow, you're taking a shower. Good night. I love you.

For Mother's Day, a joke about childbirth:

The proud father stood by his wife's bed in the hospital, as their new baby dozed at her side.

"So tell me how it was, darling," he said, taking her hand. "What did it actually feel like to give birth?"

She glanced at him, silent for moment.

"OK, honey," she said. "Smile as hard as you can."

The new father beamed broadly down at his wife.

"That's not so hard," he said, through gritted teeth.

"Now, tuck your thumbs under your upper lip," she continued.

He complied, still smiling broadly, both hands bunched in front of his face.

"Now, stretch your lip as far as it will go," she said.

"Dat's still not so bah," he said.

"Right," she continued. "Now, pull your lip over your head."