I don’t want to write reviews for L.L. Bean’s new fleet of khaki pants with stain-resistant polyester and a comfort fit waistband. I don’t want to spend my days coming up with 40 different ways to call them awesome because the fall catalog is due out in 3 months and I need to make the feature page.
I don’t want to look at proofs of the L.L. Bean model named Mark, he of the obnoxiously cheery smile (or cavalier smirk), which he uses to coax modest, blue-collar fathers into buying a pair of his green khakis and a toffee zip-up turtleneck.
My dream was not to write witty, 3-sentence paragraphs describing styles and fabrics for a mail order catalog that ships to hundreds of subscribers in every small suburban town in America. Bob and Dana Ashton on Main Street. Carl and Helen Hornbuckle on Sheep Pasture Road. Rich and Rita Schimmelbusch of Fox Hollow Lane. These people could live without my words immortalized by Mr. Bean.
And what would such words inspire? A debate over which backpack Kyle or Dylan or Tristan will need for his first day at St. Peter’s School for Boys in Red Sweater Vests and Khaki Pants – uniform items purchased from L.L. Bean, of course.
Should he get the blue nylon backpack with Tahoma font initials? No, he should live a little and get the red canvas backpack with the new leather charms on every zipper. Turn your middle-schooler into a future executive with these classy, new zipper ornaments. He’ll have the other kids in geometry begging for more L.L. Bean shit to tease him about.
However, his mom, Karen, tried to diversify. She took him and his baby sister to the Mall so his first day of school outfit would be complete. First stop: JC Penney. Franklin, the shoe salesman, tried to fit Kyle with six different embarrassing excuses for children’s loafers, his plan to offer Karen a 10% discount if she opened a JC Penney account that day percolating in his brain.
But alas, no Hush Puppy fit.
Karen made a desperate detour towards the Young Men’s denim section where it’s wall-to-wall Arizona Brand blue denim. The Stonewashed, Blatantly Bleached and Random Holes That Make These Cool styles were nothing like Kyle saw in the traditional L.L. Bean catalog. Karen admired the price tags of each pair and told Kyle that maybe he could pick just one.
But then, Kyle’s sister started crying out of impatience and the lack of attention. The trip was aborted. A slump-shouldered return home was made.
And there, waiting, were the words I’d written, ready to make Kyle’s life a living hell of clothing homogeneity.
With her failed attempt to expand Kyle’s wardrobe repertoire at JC Penney still fresh in her mind, Karen keyed onto LLBean.com and started adding the items she’d dog-eared in the catalog to her Shopping Cart.
When she was through, there I went. Into the trash with paid electric bills and the Oriental Trading Magazine – the only non-reputable mail-order catalog in the industry. My writing, my hard work, my gimmicky catch phrases and endearing fabric recognition: all gone to hell.
I don’t want to write about khakis for L.L. Bean.
Support independent writing.
For more from Phil…
Past work on FlipCollective.com.
To follow him on Twitter.
To send him an email.
independent writing is support by the public at large and the ones that take the risks and find a way to recount or cover something in a totally different way than before.
hunter s thompson comes to mind. espeically his break with magazines and papers from becoming a sportswriter/political columnist.
start handing in things to LL Bean like “Mark looks demure in his new polyester sweater as he approaches his fifth murder victim in the woods. His initialed rugged burgandy backpack accentuates the gleam of blood trickling from his uneven smile.”
see what happens.