Area man prefers his shirt tucked in

A friend recently conducted a set of complicated shirttail negotiations with her 12-year-old son.

The event was sixth-grade graduation and he wanted to participate with his shirttails untucked.

She informed him that he had exactly one option: tucked.

He proposed a compromise. He would tuck in one side, while leaving the other side fashionably out.

She informed him that all shirttails – right and left, fore and aft – would remain fully tucked at all times.

“What if my shirt suddenly becomes untucked on the auditorium stage?” he asked. “What are you going to do about it then?”

“You’ll be the only kid at sixth-grade graduation whose mother has to jump on stage and forcibly jam his shirttails down his pants,” she replied.

Oh.

The kid eventually acknowledged the strength of his mother’s argument. He remained tucked.

I bring this up to illustrate an extremely complicated sartorial issue for all males, not just for sixth-graders with hard-headed moms: When do you tuck and when do you remain untucked?

I admit to coming from an era when tucked-in was the norm. Tucking in has served society well in many circumstances, including job interviews, funerals, weddings and other formal occasions, such as going to work.

For that reason, many of the fashion-impaired men of my generation have chosen simply to always tuck in their shirts. We like these kinds of simple solutions, because then we never have to make any fashion decisions. It’s the same reason that we own 12 pairs of dress socks, all black. We never have to stand there over the sock drawer saying, “Do I go with the mauve socks today? Or the paisley?”

Similarly, when we don a shirt, we don’t even have to think. We cram it down under the old waistband. End of issue.

Recently, however, I have been informed that an all-tucking policy means I look neat and well-dressed about half the time, and utterly dorky the other half.

I prefer not to go into details about these multiple fashion violations. I have my pride. I’ll just give you brief excerpts of dialogue from various friends and family members:

“Dude, it’s a Hawaiian shirt. You see a lot of Hawaiians with their shirts tucked in? Are you the biggest square I know, or what?”

“See how this shirt has squared-off tails? With vents? And pictures of trout? Those are your clues. You can leave it untucked.”

“Look, the thing was designed for freedom of movement. Why would you even want to tuck it in? It’s a bowling shirt.”

“Please. It’s a T-shirt. A Bloomsday T-shirt. I’ll bet you ironed it, too.”

For the record, no, I do not iron my T-shirts. But I do like them tucked in.

In the last 10 years or so, a new, non-tucked fashion has taken over the mainstream American male population. It’s a regular, collared shirt worn over a T-shirt – yet the collared shirt is not only untucked, but unbuttoned. It is worn like a light jacket.

I don’t know which fashion genius originated this style, but I know it was popularized through the American sitcom. Jerry Seinfeld was partial to it and then Ray Romano brought it to full fruition on “Everybody Loves Raymond.”

Today, every male between 7 and 45 has adopted it as the casual go-to look around the home, at the mall, and even at work for those millions who can get away with it.

As a 50-something man, I am a bit long in the tooth for this essentially youthful style. Yet, stung by recent criticism of my tucking obsession – and aware that it can effectively hide the old spare tire – I tried it one day last week.

I hated it. Who wants all of that shirt material flapping around your midsection?

I immediately buttoned it up and tucked in.

My mother, who was visiting that day, was speaking for many mothers when she looked at me and said, “I don’t know why. It just looks better tucked in.”