A suit should should obscure its wearer through silence as opposed to volume. I strive to disappear. And it often works.

People often relate to my suit rather than me. They do this through the medium of pop-cultural reference points. They often believe I like a certain type of music or have a certain job or enjoy certain movies or act a certain way. Whatever they associate with a suit, they associate with me.

And their conclusions are always wrong. They say more about the people jumping to them than they ever do about me. Lacking introspection, they never realize that the whole thing has occurred within their own minds. They had the expectations and they disapointed them. I just sat there.

The weird thing is, wherever I am, the majority of people will leap to the same conclusions about content. If I wear the same suit in a different place on the same night, I hear different references. The world lives in the shadow of pop.  People in the same places share the same shade.

Just the other night, I spent the evening in a bar at a hip-hop show. It was better than watching television. This crowd’s reaction to a fellow in a suit, listening to a friend DJ while chatting up the barmaids, was singular: Fear.

Though I wore a simple, navy blue, three piece pinstripe with a purple tie, people insisted that I looked like a killer. They were even specific about what killer. And this is what surprises me — how specific the unseen hive mind often is. The general consensus was that I resembled that fellow in “American Psycho.” I don’t know much about that movie. I saw it once, years ago, and I can’t say that I cared for it. All I remember is that the ending lost me.

But drunken women draped themselves off my arms, told me that I was “just as dope as he was” and asked me not to kill them. I assured them that I wasn’t going to kill anyone. Then I changed the subject. Frankly, the more someone speaks to me, the less I can guarantee their safety.

Though the pop-reference was different –this time to a movie character– the pattern remains the same. People see me then relate me to something general. Then to something amazingly specific. They’re disapointed when I don’t fulfill their contract between their imagination and my suit. Everyone would have been much happier if I had of started shooting. Except me.

I’m quite content with being a disappointment. Just ask my family.