I’m not sure how common it is to remember the exact moment you fell in love with clothing. I assume some women can recall trying on a designer dress or buying their first luxury handbag. I’m sure there are plenty of finance types who remember getting their first Brooks Brothers or J. Press suit and feeling the sense of having “made it.”
For me, there was a flashpoint in my childhood that I can say with confidence flipped a switch in my brain and granted me a crude consciousness of taste.
It happened at age fifteen, while I was working part time at a pair of car washes. After getting dropped off for work each day by my father, my first responsibility was dumping trash cans that had been filled to the brim with customers’ used coffee cups and snack food wrappers as they vacuumed out their Buicks and Mazdas. Following garbage duty, I’d typically spend an hour or two hosing down the bays to remove the clods of mud left by F-150s and Dodge Rams. Then, I’d typically take a break and head to the Sheetz next door to spend a third of my wages on a soft pretzel, milkshake, fries, or other fried Pennsylvania delicacies.
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