Category: Bow Ties

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Not A Fungus Among Us

Bow Tie o’ the Day and I went to a follow-up appointment with my dermatologist this morning. It seems that the exotic rash on my torso—which the dermatologist suspected was some sort of fungal infection—remains a mystery. The skin samples the doctor chiseled out of me for biopsy at my last appointment turned out to be not fungal at all. I am sorely disappointed—not because I want my skin to have a fungus, but because I want to know what my rash IS. Knowing what it is will mean the doctor can give me the correct treatment, and the rash can be successfully eliminated from my pale-and-pasty white skin. I want it gone—now. So the doc carved out two deeper-than-last-time skin samples for biopsy, and wrote me a prescription for a set of x-rays. Apparently, my stubborn skin rash is a medical puzzle to be solved, and the dermatologist is determined to find the answers for us both. Instead of being annoyed by my pesky skin malady, I have decided to treat the whole affair like an adventure—during which I can amuse myself by learning a thing or two about skin and dermatological science. Perhaps I will eventually write a world-changing, epic poem about what I learn about aberrant skin patches. I could decide to be crabby and picked-on about the situation, but I am not a bigly believer in wallowing in miserablism. I hate that particular -ism. All that being miserable would get me is the confounding rash with a dollop of misery on top. Ain’t nobody needs any o’ that. And nobody wants to read about it either. 📖🤓

BTW As I was checking in at the front desk for my appointment, the receptionist complimented me on Bow Tie o’ the Day and my face mask and shirt. An assistant who was also behind the desk chimed in, “Are you a teacher? From the way you’re dressed, it looks like you’d be a fun teacher.” That was the first such comment I’ve ever heard about my “look.” Of course, I was a teacher for years back in the day. I guess it shows.

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Getting Ahead Of Ourselves

Today is Groundhog’s Day Eve and I’ve caught my first glimpse of Easter candy!

My slim, diamond-point Bow Tie o’ the Day looks very sequin-y. And my mask affirms I’m sarcastically just rollin’ with the conspiracy theories again. In reality, I am an Occam’s Razor gal, through-and-through. That means I hold with the idea that the simplest explanation for something is most likely to be the one that’s correct. My nearly six decades of experience on the planet has taught me that this is so. There are exceptions to this principle, which fall neatly under this phrase: “the exception that proves the rule.” Complexities and implausibilities might make a story seem more dramatic or otherwise interesting, but complexities and implausibilities don’t make a story true—whether we’re talking about literature, conspiracy theories, or real life. The sustaining meat of any truth is its simplicity and efficiency. 💡

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Bow Tie Looks A-OK, But It Reeks

Bow Tie o’ the Day has been a bad bow tie, and it must go to the dump. I discovered it today, laying crumpled beneath shelves in the garage. It is so stinky I had to seal it in a biohazard bag before I could properly dispose of it in the garbage can. I don’t know exactly what trouble it got itself into, but y’all should consider yourself lucky this post is not a scratch-n-sniff. Bow Tie reeks of some kind of nauseatingly malodorous waywardness. If I were pressed to describe the critter’s rotting stench I would say it smells like a triple cross between day-old fish guts, dog teeth tartar, and an ingrown toenail infection. I don’t even want to speculate about the possibilities of what, where and/or how Bow Tie’s tragic olfactory tragedy came about—other than to say that somehow Bow Tie got restless and escaped from the Tie Room, only to eventually come to its nose-offending demise on the garage floor, in a cobwebbed corner. I’m infinitely fascinated by the eventful lives of all my neckwear, but I think I’m glad I don’t know the specific story of how this once-promising little darling came to its sorry stenchification.

Rest In Peace, my ill-fated tiny fashion accessory! I shall never forget you. Especially your rancid scent.👃 R. I. P., P. U.

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A Visit To The Dermatologist

Here’s a bit o’ wisdom I have gathered over the years: When going to a new doctor for the first time, it is best to tone down the loudness of my idiosyncratic fashion. To display my clashion in its most eye-opening forms at a first doctor appointment risks scaring the new doctor. And you know dang well it is not wise to scare a doctor who is in charge of treating your body. I don’t know about you, but I want my doctor to be focused on my ailment, not on trying to decipher the meaning of my attire—at least not until they get to know me, and realize that my normal is not like anybody else’s normal. For this reason, when I had a first appointment with a dermatologist yesterday, I chose a plain-ish blue shirt, a solid-color hat, a doctor-friendly face mask, and a perfectly mellow-but-gorgeous Bow Tie o’ the Day. Yes, I was wearing a pair of golf pants, which my doctor immediately noticed and swooned over. It seemed I had chosen my get-up well.

Anyhoo… For the past three years, I have had a patchy rash on some areas of my torso. The rash is not hideous, and it doesn’t ooze, hurt, or itch. It hasn’t spread anywhere else. It just hasn’t gone away. For the first year, I tried to treat it with various creams, lotions, and gels—convinced it was just something to do with my notoriously dry skin. I figured it would eventually go away. After almost a year of the recalcitrant rash, I knew it was time to make an appointment with a dermatologist. But that’s when the pandemic showed up, and making an appointment with a doctor to deal with a problem that was stubborn and vaguely annoying but otherwise not causing me any discomfort—well, that wasn’t gonna happen. At about the time it was getting easier to get a doc appointment again, my Cranky Hanky Panky flipped out and I had to deal with doctors about that for almost another year. It’s been three months since my pancreas surgery, so I decided it was time to finally make an appointment with a dermatologist. Which I did.

Yesterday was my initial appointment. I have been supremely curious to get to the bottom of what these seemingly innocuous rashy patches on my front and back are all about. The doctor walked into the exam room and—after complimenting me on my golf pants—her eyes lit up at the sight of my rash. She circled my torso with glee. I kid you not: she was grinning and her eyes got bigly. I asked her if she knew what it was, and a bunch of Latin words came out of her mouth. I had never heard of anything she said. I asked her to tell me in English, and she said: “You have a skin fungus. It’s one of four different types. We’ll have to do a biopsy to find out exactly which one it is, then we’ll know how to treat it.” Well, okay then. I was glad to have something close to an answer. Then she took chunks out of my torso in three different spots and sent them off for biopsy. (The doctor will call me with the results in a few days.) My doctor grinned throughout the whole office visit. She was downright giddy. Apparently, what I have is not something she has seen often. The doctor asked if I would let her colleague come in to view my rash, and I was fine with that. So my doc left and the other dermatologist came in—also grinning as she circled me, again and again, with a special light. She was giddy, too. I was a spectacle, and not for my clothing choices. My doc’s colleague said she had never seen this particular skin problem in real life. She spent more time perusing my rash than my own doctor. And then when she was done examining me, she thanked me profusely for letting her look at my stubborn patches. My skin malady is something exotic! Of course, that makes me feel like I’m cool right down to my literal skin. I felt kind of like the Elephant Man. I should have charged admission.

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A Colorful Winter’s Day

Not only did my new golf pants arrive, but so did my pink-and-orange argyle vest! My crossword Bow Tie o’ the Day tops the geometrics of my attire. And a paisley shirt lifts the clashion to superb-ity on yet an even higher level of style. I love an outfit like this. There is simply no way anything can discourage me or sadden me as I be-bop through the world when I am dressed like this. I highly recommend it to y’all. If I had to describe what my preferred fashion is to someone in 4 words, I would say it is “dressing loud and happy.” Of course, if anybody asks me to describe my fashion aesthetic tomorrow, I will likely describe the look in 4 entirely different words—because I’ll be wearing something completely different then. I’m fickle like that, but only concerning my wardrobe.

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Well, Here’s An Idea

How ’bout these bigly hair Bow Ties o’ the Day! This is simultaneously my kind o’ thing and NOT my kind o’ thing. The Australian singer-songwriter, Sia, can clearly pull this off. It is definitely and completely her kind of thing, and I’m going to pay it proper homage by not even attempting it for myself. When someone else has created a singular style, don’t let yourself become a knock-off imitation. Simply appreciate it. Relax and enjoy the specific points of someone else’s self-expression. I admire the audacity, flair, and panache of Sia’s bigly hair bow ties. No matter how you feel about this look, one thing is for sure: you cannot look away. And it’s about bow ties. No bow tie has ever taken life too seriously. What’s not to adore about that vibe?

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A Copper Bow Tie Is My Two Cents

I can’t wait until my copper Bow Tie o’ the Day begins to get its green patina from being exposed to the elements. When I’m not wearing it, I should probably store it somewhere humid—like in the bathroom by the shower. Or perhaps I should attach it to one of Suzanne’s outside flower pots by the sprinklers, through Spring and Summer. Or both. It’ll take years for the green patina to grow and refine its full-blown protective layer, but a snappy copper bow tie deserves to reach its full artistic potential. It deserves to turn green and evolve into its own historically fashionable greatness over time. Bow ties are people too, you know.

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A Stick For All Time

I’m sure I have felt just about every human way there is to feel in life, many times over. One thing I don’t remember often feeling is bored. I can find something interesting to occupy my mind in anything and everything. As evidence of this fact, I present this photo—in which I am wearing my Stan Laurel face and a bejeweled, fancy Bow Tie o’ the Day, while happily reading Henry Petroski’s history of the toothpick. Yes, I really do find even the evolution of the modern toothpick captivating. Based on the length of Petroski’s THE TOOTHPICK, toothpicks have had at least 353-pages of stick adventures throughout their existence. Go, toothpicks!

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Saturday Is A Special Day, Yet Again

High-tops Bow Tie o’ the Day knows it’s true. If it’s Saturday, household chores will get done. It’s a habit I don’t see myself changing at this point in my life. I’ve mentioned before how that Primary song about Saturday being a special day gets stuck in my head every Saturday. It always has, and it always will. I was brainwashed into doing housework with that song. Oh, it’s okay. I have no illusions about the inner-soundtrack of my Saturday mornings ever being anything different. I used to fight it, but I don’t anymore. However, I’m always at the ready to add to the Saturday playlist in my noggin. Along with the heavily rotated Primary song of my youth, “Saturday,” there are songs like “Saturday Night” by The Bay City Rollers, and “Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting” by Elton John. One of my fave songs to have stuck in my head on a Saturday is Tom Waits’ “The Heart of Saturday Night.” And there are plenty more Saturday-reference songs to add. If you’re a better Utah Mormon than I am, your Saturday playlist can include every song on the SATURDAY’S WARRIOR soundtrack—randomly shuffled, or in order! Whatever music is stuck in your head while you’re checking off tasks on your Saturday to-do list, it is imperative that you sing out each song with exuberance and pride. The quality of your voice isn’t what’s important. What’s important is to sing loud enough to let the next-door neighbors know you’re choring and you’re happy about it. Above all, remember where you came from: Primary.

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Find Your Passion And Purpose, Then Fly

Bow Tie o’ the Day and I have been ruminating on the ideas of purpose and passion today. Naturally, for me, that meant I dug up one of my haggard copies of Annie Dillard’s book of essays called TEACHING A STONE TO TALK. The first essay in the collection is called “Living Like Weasels,” and it references the story of a man who once shot an eagle out of the sky. (Bad man!) Upon examining the freshly dead eagle, the man discovered the dry skull of a weasel with its jaws attached to the eagle’s throat. It seemed a reasonable assumption that the eagle had at one time pounced on the weasel, and the weasel had swiftly and instinctively swiveled and bit the eagle’s throat. The weasel lost its life to the eagle, but its dead jaws remained clenched on the eagle’s throat for who-knows-how-long until the eagle itself fell prey to its executioner, and all that remained of the weasel was its skull’s clenched jaw. The weasel latched on, with all of its instinctive weasel purpose and passion, most of its body falling away piece by piece over time. The weasel flew high, even to its own end. But imagine what unbelievable things that dying weasel got to see—if only for a few moments—of the world from up in the sky, where it had never before been in its tiny weasel life!

The essay ends with this call to find our own purpose and passion:

“We could, you know. We can live any way we want. People take vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience—even of silence—by choice. The thing is to stalk your calling in a certain skilled and supple way, to locate the most tender and live spot and plug into that pulse. This is yielding, not fighting….

“I think it would be well, and proper, and obedient, and pure, to grasp your one necessity and not let it go, to dangle from it limp wherever it takes you. Then even death, where you’re going no matter how you live, cannot you part. Seize it and let it seize you up aloft even, till your eyes burn out and drop; let your musky flesh fall off in shreds, and let your very bones unhinge and scatter, loosened over fields, over fields and woods, lightly, thoughtless, from any height at all, from as high as eagles.”

Chew on that. Ponder those images. Then ask yourself if you hold that tightly to anything? Got purposes? Got passions? If you’re lucky, you know exactly who you are and what you’re about. You’re already flying.