
My wife knows it’s a no-no for me to wear white anything. It would be a guarantee, probably within minutes, of me staining the shirt, pants or sweater. Bets would be placed to guess how quickly I could spill something on the pristine piece of clothing.
I learned long ago not to buy white golf shirts or pants. On TV, you see golfers with Mr. Clean bright white pants. They dazzle the eyes. But when I look at them, all I see are stains waiting to happen.
How the heck can they keep those white pants so clean? I’d really like to know. With all the traveling and wiping their hands after they clean mud or grass off their ball or club, I can’t figure out why there aren’t smears of life covering multiple parts of the pants.
And then there’s the white shirts. How the heck do the armpit stains not show? When they sweat and it’s windy out and dust is blowing around, how does that white shirt continue to sparkle shot after shot?
I don’t get it. There’s a klutziness factor in our family, handed down by my dad. I inherited the gene big time, as did my two brothers. We regularly mock each other by handing out “El Klutzo” awards for the biggest klutziness maneuver.
Mine, recently (and I haven’t told the bros this one yet), occurred last week. I wore one of those short-sleeved golf windbreakers to work. While not 100 percent white, it was just slightly off-white. And pristine when I drove to work.
Something happened that day. I don’t know what. But when I went out for lunch, there were gray smears in four or five spots in the area of my gut. How did they get there? How the heck should I know? But it will allow me to take over the El Klutzo award lead. I’ll jump to the head of the standings.
That’s the thing about white clothes (or other solid light color clothing as well). It has a magical, dare I say even mystical, ability to attract the dirt of the world and become a mess in less time than it takes to drink a cup of coffee. And really, don’t even think about having a cup of coffee or considering cooking or eating spaghetti. You’re courting disaster.
Our dad accepted a challenge from us at a family dinner a number of years before he passed away. We were giving him a hard time about how he stained his shirt when he ate, and we told him he couldn’t make it through dinner without splashing something on it. He pulled up so closely to the dinner table that his gut and chest were pinned to the table, and he placed a thick napkin over it, so no food could get through.
He ate carefully. He didn’t slop it down the way he usually did. He pushed away from the table with pride afterwards. And sure enough, there were stains down the front.
That’s me with white shirts or pants. There is no hope. White clothes look sharp on pro golfers. But for me, they’re just props so I can win the El Klutzo award.