Real men wear pink
At Macon's Cherry Blossom Festival, we no longer have to apologize for walking around medium rare
A man sitting a few tables from us was wearing a pink shirt at the restaurant Monday night.
“This is the only thing I have that’s pink,’’ he said, almost apologetically.
I had on a red sweatshirt, mostly for warmth on a chilly March night. His wife wanted to know why I wasn’t in dress code, as if she was a teacher looking to give me a demerit.
I told her I had worn pink most of the day. We were on our way to our granddaughter’s softball game, so I switched to something more comfortable.
Trust me. If you take inventory in my closet, you will see that I own three pink shirts and a half-dozen cherry blossom ties. Granted, this is about the only time I wear them, during the 10-day window of the Cherry Blossom Festival, although I have been known to pull out my pink button-down for other occasions on the calendar.
I also have had to retire a few articles of pink clothing over the years. I have worn out all those pink threads across four decades of festivals. May they rest in peace.
It took years, but I no longer apologize for walking around looking medium rare this time of year. It took guts, but the most of the guys in this town have come around. They will admit — or confess — to having at least a little pink in their wardrobes the third week of March.
There was a time, though, when we had to swallow our macho pride. After all, look at the sports schedule for the next two weeks. There are no men’s teams in the NCAA basketball tournament or major league baseball teams with pink in their color scheme. At The Masters golf tournament, they award a green jacket, not a pink one.
Within the Yoshino bubble where we reside, we carry a disclaimer. The powers that be have granted us a pink pardon. We are allowed to drift over to the soft side of red. We don’t have to dress incognito to shop in the men’s department at Belk’s, where there are sales on apparel the color of bubble gum and neckwear the shade of Pepto-Bismol.
What started as a few brave men donning pink sports coats has evolved. It is now considered fashionable for men to wear pink britches with pink suspenders and pink caps.
It used to turn heads. Now, hardly anyone bats an eye. (You should have seen the hot pink shoes my old boss, Don Bailey, a member of the festival’s board of directors, was wearing this past Saturday afternoon. Only Dorothy’s ruby slippers had more pizzazz.)
I once owned a pair of pink socks given to me by some ladies who worked in the hosiery mills in Fort Payne, Alabama. At the Cherry Blossom Festival Author's Luncheon in 2014, I was presented with a T-shirt that reads: "Real Men Wear Pink.’’
Charles Jay, one of the truly Southern gentlemen in our town, is among Macon's “pink pioneers." He is credited with owning the first pink sports coat in Macon.
Yes, he was a trailblazer in that blazer.