Professional Dress

Prior to shaving his hair to a mohawk style and dying the mohawk a deep ocean blue, Jacob had carefully considered which artificial hair color would match his suits best. He had been wavering between red and navy all week. Jacob had finally decided on navy after he had stood in the hair dye aisle at Sally’s Beauty Supply and held up a few of his more conservative ties to the bottles of Manic Panic “Shocking Blue” and “Rock ‘N Roll Red”. The blue definitely allowed for a greater range of sartorial mixing and matching.

Jacob had never dyed his hair before, nor had it dyed by anyone else, but had researched the process by reading the official Manic Panic website, wading through some Reddit threads, and watching several YouTube how to videos. Jacob had a two sink vanity in his master bathroom and was in the habit of leaving the countertop around the left sink empty, as if he was expecting a visitor to come and unpack their toiletries at any moment. Today was no different: he set out the bottle of hair dye and the rest of the requisite items on “his side” of the vanity, careful to observe the invisible boundary.

It had started with a pair of socks decorated with eggs and bacon on them, given to Jacob as a groomsmens’ gift at a friend’s wedding. Jacob loved gifts which served a practical use. He had not bought himself any new articles of dress clothing, including socks, since he started to work at the firm three years ago: the bacon and eggs would certainly be a change to his weekly rotation of navy and black socks.

The first day Jacob wore the socks to the office, he was surprised by the delight he felt every time he caught a glimpse of the whimsical pattern. He saw it first when he turned away from his desk and crossed one ankle over the other in order to listen to a co-worker talk at him: seeing one of the yellow yolks peek out from under his pant cuff brought a smile to Jacob’s face. Later in the afternoon, as Jacob took a break from sitting to stretch out his legs, he grinned again as he caught a glance of a slice of bacon, frozen forever in mid-sizzle.

Jacob wanted to share his new found joy with his co-workers, but was not outgoing enough to march up to someone at their desk and simply show off his socks. Instead, for a period of two weeks, he took periodic breaks to walk around the office and strike poses which would “accidentally” reveal his socks: he might bend over to scratch a non-existent itch on his calf by the coffee maker or put his foot up on a chair in lunch room to tie a shoe that had not been untied in the first place.

But no one said a word to Jacob about his socks. He was dumbfounded. After thinking about it for another week, Jacob decided it was because pattern was kind of small: maybe his office mates thought the bacon and eggs were just misshapen paisley. So he went online and found socks with larger, even more colorful patterns on them: pizza socks, chess piece socks, Captain America socks, stegosaurus socks. He wore them to work now on a daily basis, taking extra laps around public office areas at lunch to show them off. Still, Jacob’s co-workers said nothing.

One night soon thereafter, when Jacob was walking home with Chinese takeout, he passed the window of a local head shop and saw them: a pair of Doc Marten’s saddle shoes. As he thought of pairing them with his novelty socks, Jacob got goosebumps: these shoes were just what he needed to emphasize his socks. Jacob went into the store and bought the shoes immediately, his lo mein growing cold in its greasy brown paper bag.

The next day, Jacob found himself so excited to wear his new dress shoes his fingers shook slightly as he tied the laces for the first time. Like the socks, simply looking down at his Doc Martens throughout the day brightened his mood instantly. But also like the socks, Jacob’s co-workers and supervisors said nothing. Even the office admins, which Jacob overheard gossiping about a variety of mundane occurrences on a regular basis, did not seem to notice.

Watching Wall Street on TV one night, Jacob observed Gordon Gekko wearing suspenders. Jacob bought five pairs of novelty suspenders on Amazon that same evening, particularly interested in trying out a pair that lit up with LED lights. The week after that, Jacob ordered one necktie for every Marvel movie character he liked. While getting dressed every morning continued to put him in a better and better mood, Jacob lived every work day like a balloon with a slow leak: he was deflated by the time he left the office, no one saying a word about his new clothes and accessories.

A few weeks later, as Jacob made the appointment to get his right ear pierced, he wondered if no one at the office had said anything to him because decisions were being made to discipline him or speak to him privately about the recent changes he had made to his professional dress. His annual performance review was one week away and Jacob imagined what type of interaction he and his supervisors–his advisory team, firm lingo called them–might have. Would they be angry? Would they be concerned? Would they express sadness at these recent changes? Jacob did not know, but preoccupied himself for days by envisioning several different performance review scenarios, barely noticing the pinch of the needle as it slid through his ear’s cartilage.

Jacob’s performance review, however, proved the same as it had the two years prior: his advisory team praised his work ethic, noted his continued progression as a technical expert, and said they looked forward to another year of the same. Jacob had sat in the conference room long after the partners and senior managers left, blinking in stunned silence, noticing the obligatory cups of coffee poured by an admin prior to the meeting starting still wafted up tendrils of steam.

Jacob’s nose wrinkled at the smell of the hair dye as he unscrewed the cap and began to apply it carefully to his hair. Although he had felt the same way when he bought the socks, the saddle shoes, the suspenders, the ties, and his earring, he was once again certain that this time, this change in his appearance was going to be the one that was going to do it. This time people would stop and ask why, why did he do it?

Maybe they would even ask, “Jacob: are you okay?”