Flightster

Booya! In Your North Face!

• by Colin Wright
• on February 22nd, 2011
• Leave a Comment

I have a fairly distinctive style.

You can see it in my work, in my writing, in my personal grooming and in how I dress. It’s me. I’m aware of it, and I like it.

It makes me feel comfortable to be exposed to aesthetics that I appreciate.

Let me take a moment to clarify – in case you didn’t click the ‘how I dress’ link above – my style is not what most people would call ‘outdoorsy.’ The opposite, actually. I’m usually fairly out of place while hiking or canoeing or running from bears.

I’m kind of a city guy, and my clothing reflects that.

So knowing this, imagine my confusion when I found myself in REI a handful of days ago perusing the racks of really practical jackets they had on display, trying to find something that calmly, confidently said ‘I’m traveling and don’t want to be cold’ rather than ‘I’m EXTREME and maybe part robot!’ or ‘I live in a cabin that I built myself’ like most of the offerings I was checking out.

After trying on a charming little number that mumbled something about ‘working on a fishing boat in the Arctic,’ I wasn’t feeling too great about my choices, but I told myself that this was the day…the day I would get some kind of crazy synthetic jacket that would be the most practical article of clothing I’ve ever owned AND not make me feel like my pockets should be stuffed with homemade granola and Greenpeace pamphlets.

Then I saw it.

It was actually strung up on the wrong rack, but it felt right as soon as I picked it up.

A jacket with the pockets and practicality of a parka, but with the structure and simplicity of a little black dress. It seemed to say ‘I’m wearing this because it’s cold, but I’m not going camping. In fact, I brought my laptop. Booya! In your North Face!’

And now here I am in Reykjavik, Iceland, not freezing my butt off as I had originally intended because I put in a little time to explore a shop that I would normally only go to for rip-resistant tarps or very small flashlight keychains.

It’s funny what travel can do to a person. It’s not that you change exactly, it’s more that you adapt in a million little ways.

We’re all developing and slowly evolving constantly, and these threads of travel-related changes just work their way into that ever-fluctuating structure, barely-noticeable except by those who only see you periodically and weren’t there to ease into the changes.

I’m fascinated by this shift, and even though I pay close attention to my own changes, I still miss a goodly number of them and find myself shocked at my own actions from time to time, when one of them that snuck by rears its head a bit later after it’s not so small anymore.

My taste in clothing hasn’t really changed, by it HAS slightly adapted to allow for more practical clothing as I’ve started to travel.

Back in the day I wouldn’t seriously consider any jacket that wasn’t also as part of a suit, but now I mostly look for how many pockets it has, where they are and whether or not they can hold my iPod and passport. Is their room for immigration documents and handfuls of thick, foreign coins? Bonus!

It’s frightening in a way – to think that every time I return to the United States I may be a different person – but it’s something I’ve come to terms with and even embraced.

I get to try out a lot of different lifestyles! And different kinds of clothing, relationships, accommodations and foods!

This is good! It means that I’m much more likely to discover the right combination of things that make me happy and will be less likely to totally miss out on some aspect of life that would make me incredibly happy out of sheer ignorance.

I may still fight it, of course, but I’m convinced that struggle is part of the process.

If I hadn’t been so repelled by the outdoorsy styles that make up most of REI’s stock, I may not have been so drawn to the jacket I ended up with, since it seemed to stand out in such stark contrast from the rest.

I’m glad that fight is there, though, because without it I wouldn’t be joyfully jaunting around Iceland the way I am; I’d be freezing my manparts off and cursing my sense of style for exposing me to the frigid elements in addition to aesthetics…not a great tradeoff.

Colin Wright

Colin Wright is a minimalist, branding expert and serial entrepreneur. While running his blog Exile Lifestyle ,his branding studio Colin Is My Name and his e-publishing business ebookling. Colin travels the world (moving to a new country every 4 months), meeting up with amazing people, giving talks (to audiences ranging from tech industry professionals to college students to Catholic school girls) and hunting down new and interesting experiences.