I heard somewhere that people tend to stick with the same clothing styles, mostly, that they picked up in college. Since William and Mary hasn't had any notable fashion changes since 1947, my daily uniform is pretty predictable and conservative; with the addition of rolled-up jeans.

My current pseudo-job keeps me on the Hopkins campus daily. Hopkins is also reasonably conservative. There's a certain segment of the campus populace that matches the folk I ran with in Williamsburg; the fraternity and sorority set. The vast majority of students here are grinds, though--their fashion statement is no fashion. They'll worry about that when they're card-carrying astrophysicists. And of course there are the token freaks; those who purposefully garb themselves as nonsensically as possible. (Anyone remember Tornado Head and the Fuzzy Pumper?)

It's those few who actually ARE hip that I hate to see. Not only does their attire make me realize that the polo-shirt and penny loafers look of my own collegiate era is long gone, but...well, the latest styles are patently hideous.

You can call them "flares" all you like, ladies, but the fact remains that they're bell bottoms. And what's going on with the fuzzy tube tops? There are girls wandering around campus in outfits that look like somebody's grandmother's matching toilet tank cover and Kleenex box cover set. And boys in baggy raver-kid pants? Well, at least the men's styles hide what you want hidden; the women's clothes of the moment leave nothing to the imagination. There are some body parts on some people that are better imagined than experienced.

Take it from we who were able to pull off Jams without looking utterly (mostly, but not utterly) idiotic. You're not old enough to remember 1972, when these styles first came around. They looked stupid then and, tarted up for 2003, they look even more stupid now.

I've observed over the past 20 years, or however long I've been noticing what people wear, that certain elements of society tend to lag behind the mainstream by about ten or fifteen years. The people we called "heads" in high school were wearing their hair long and hippie-ish clothes in 1985. The same group, in 1970, was still wearing flannel oxford shirts and crew cuts.

This boils down to one hideous fact: Wal-Mart Darlene will, in ten years, be wearing low-rider bellbottoms and a fuzzy pink tube top.