No, I don't want no scrubs . . . pants at least.

I wore dress pants today. Normally, I wouldn’t really notice such as thing, but as I have been pretty much exclusively wearing scrubs for the workday the last five months, everything felt foreign. I originally thought I had incorrectly buttoned my top button before tying my tie because it felt so tight. And upon actually buttoning it, I began to get the claustrophobic hyperventilating feeling that I remember having as a six year-old forced to wear a clip-on.

However, the other new article of clothing proved to be surprisingly pleasant. I had forgotten that some varieties of dress pants are surprisingly comfortable. I may be exaggerating the effect since I have been used to wearing hospital scrub pants that I believe are made from burlap exported from the USSR in the cold war era.

These specific pants (someone please tell me why I have to pluralize this sentence) were extremely lightweight and (dare I say) felt flowing. Never have a I worn a pair of jeans and thought, man these jeans are so comfortable, I could forget I am wearing them. In fact, I think jeans may derive some of their comfort by making you always aware of their presence (whereas sweatpants derive their comfort by making you feel like you are wearing a pillow . . . also pleasant).

Part of the issue is that apparently dress pants can be made incredibly thin. It seems counter-intuitive, but they are not able to make jeans that thin. Unless, of course, they are the Old Navy variety, in which case those jeans have a shelf life for me of about 6 months. Month one is thin and comfortable. In month two they begin to feature holes so that they look as if I purchased them off the rack at Hollister or its partner in crime Abercrombie and Fitch. In month three, they begin to have a sort of thinning feeling so that I move slowly and gingerly as if to not expose the jeans to too much stretch. In month four I realize that anything I put in my pockets somehow travel down my pantleg and into my shoe. And inevitably I try not to wear them for month five and in month six I rediscover them and think “oh man, I forgot about these jeans.” Then I wear them, proceed to attempt to change a tire or something of the like and as my fruit loops boxer shorts are exposed to the world, I remember why I had put them in the back of the closet. Yet, I digress . . . rapidly.

The fact is that dress pants are paradoxically comfortable at times. Which almost makes it unfortunate that any sort of associated article of clothing is decidedly uncomfortable. Also unfortunate is that any comfortable article of clothing (tennis shoes, tee shirts, baseball caps, flip flops) look decidedly ridiculous in association with dress pants.

And so, I suppose the lesson for me today is that when I am breathing into a paper bag because my necktie decided to adhere to my adam’s apple, I can take solace in the fact that “hey, these pants are so comfortable I could forget I am even wearing them.” Let’s just hope I don’t pull an “emperor’s new clothes” and actually forget anytime soon.