Over the past few weeks, I’ve had occasion to wear pants: actual pants, with a button, a zipper, and belt loops, not the normal drawstring or elastic waist band numbers I’ve been living in for the past few years.

I’ve spoken before about the importance of pants, primarily the act of putting them on when you find yourself homebound either through unemployment or a pandemic. There is nothing more depressing than watching the sunset in your boxers or pajama bottoms.

For the past few years, though, I haven’t been heeding my own advice.

Pants can indicate more than you might think. When someone is grounded and humble they might say, “I put my pants on one leg at a time.” T.S. Eliot, through J. Alfred Prufrock, used “wearing [one’s] trousers rolled” as a symbol of time having passed one by.

During the pandemic, I fell into the pattern of wearing sweatpants or joggers. I didn’t feel like walking around my office (my apartment) in pants. And I got used to it, way too used to it. And this concession led to others. This may have been a coincidence, or perhaps my lack of pants was just the canary in the coal mine of my decent into sloth.

I bought a pair of Vuori shorts online (they were on sale because they were a certain shade of brown). I had some shorts from Bonobos that I continued wearing despite the fact that my dog had chewed them. They were comfortable but more importantly, they were stretchy. I didn’t have to face the fact, daily, that my other clothes had started fitting differently.

Old button down shirts, a suit that I wore to my friend’s wedding three years ago. I haven’t tried them on in years, not because I don’t think they’ll fit but because I know they won’t and I’d rather not deal with the ensuing depressing that comes in with sucking in your stomach and still not being able to button some jeans that I wore when I was still training for marathons.

After years of running somewhat obsessively, my brain said, “hey, friend, you know you don’t have to do this, right? Instead of running, you can just… not.” And that sounded like a hell of an idea. So, I started skipping runs all the time. And yet I ate and drank like someone who still ran 30 miles a week.

And that’s how I found myself constantly in shorts or stretchy joggers, which, let’s be honest, are just sweatpants with the price jacked up.

Things are, however, on the upswing. After a long, crappy summer, I’m employed again. I’m writing again. I’m going to the gym again. I’m hopeful. For what, I don’t know but, at the moment, I’ll take it.

I needed to face the future and I needed to do it properly dressed. I needed pants.

And where is a middle aged man with an expanding waistline and limited budget to go?

You know goddamned well where I went.

Old Navy.

I wanted some standard chinos. I thought some gray ones would be fine. I picked out a pair of 34″ waist chinos and took them to the dressing room. And they were tight. And this is Old Navy 34″, a very generous 34″ if memory serves. I swallowed my pride and went back for some 36″ waist pants. I tried them on, they looked good. I even got the slim cut.

I still have my joggers. I even have some multisport pants from L.L. Bean (also essentially jacked up sweats). But I have some trousers for when I’m not feeling like a total slob (worn unrolled).

There are sign posts on the road of life. If you ignore them that doesn’t mean your path isn’t changing. If you’re lost or confused and you don’t know where to go, there’s always one thing you can do.

Listen to your pants.