Coping with fashion tourettes

One day, while walking back to my office from the Ritz Carlton, I was standing on the corner of Market and Montgomery waiting to cross the street. My peripheral vision caught a man looking down at my shoes. He was wearing boot cut denim, a track jacket, Oakley sunglasses and listening to his iPod. He leaned over and examined my shoes even more. His footwear analysis caught my attention so I turned and we made eye contact.

Eye contact with strangers is awkward. For the most part, I think it’s because, at times, I am socially retarded. It can also mean a person is noticing that I have a piece of food stuck in my teeth – or even a booger. Eye contact makes me feel colossally self-conscious. It’s like a person is putting me under their own personal discerning microscope to pick apart every single thing that is wrong with me: a zit, chapped lips, the fact that I am having a bad T-zone day or my hair has been growing in the form of a manchichi.

Nonetheless, when this guy in question was staring at my shoes, I thought, “Oh no. Did I step in dog shit?” Then, the gentleman in question took his headphones out and raised his sunglasses. He smiled and said, “Where’d you get those boots?”

I looked down and proudly hollered, “YSL!”

The initials that erupted out of my mouth echoed through the Financial District. Cable cars stopped. Muni buses stopped. People halted in their tracks. Pigeons fluttered into the air as if they were in a John Woo movie. The echo spread throughout the city. Time stood still.

Okay. Not really. But I did say it quite loud.

The gentleman gave me a puzzled nod and he was on his merry way.

I, on the other hand, have been dealing with this problem for a long time: fashion tourettes.

There is only one symptom to fashion tourettes: you constantly label drop. It doesn’t matter if it’s high-end, low-end or back-end. At a moment’s notice, whether solicited or not, you will holler a designer name without thinking. You are unaware that by label dropping, you are the king (or queen) of all that is shameless, snobby and utterly pathetic. It’s almost as bad as Americans who spell words with British aesthetics (i.e. honour, flavour, saviour).

This is totally me.

I can trace this back to my childhood; kindergarten to be exact. I was sporting a Lacoste shirt and the first thing I did on the first day of school was go up to my teacher and say, “LOOK! I HAVE A CROCODILE ON MY SHIRT!” The teacher smiled and said, “Oooooh!” but what she was really thinking was, “This kid is gonna grow up to be a materialistic douche.”

As said, I even do it with more commercial brands. Once I was interviewing Nick Verreos from Project Runway season 2 and he complimented my tie. I immediately said, “IT’S FROM TARGET!”

Nick Verreos, Me and my TARGET tie

Case #2: When interviewing Andre Benjamin for his Benjamin Bixby line at Bloomingdale’s he said, “That’s a fly tie.” I blurted out, “IT’S VINTAGE!”

It’s happened numerous times after – even with Sarah Jessica Parker. She said she liked my suit (I think she was just being nice) and I belched, “IT’S FROM H&M!” While she was in shock to hear that such a nice suit was from H&M, I added to the madness and said, “BUT I’M WEARING SHOES FROM BARNEYS!” That was quite an episode for my fashion tourettes. I was a big ol’ tool.

It feels so good to get that out in the open. And if Nick, Andre and Sarah are out there reading this (because I know they read my blog everyday), I sincerely apologize for my behavior.

I do realize I have a problem with gratuitous label dropping and my friends and family have been very supportive. Instead of calling it “fashion tourettes” they sugarcoat it and just call me an “elitist label whore” – and I am TOTALLY fine with that. I have come to terms with it and I don’t see it as a problem. It’s more of a way to feel better about myself via superficial brand names. It’s shallowness at its best.

Next problem to tackle: “celebrity tourettes” – a disease where I constantly talk about celebs I have interacted with over the past couple of years.