Saving My Own Neck

One man’s battle with the tyranny of the tie.

Photo by Curated Lifestyle for Unsplash+

What an honor and privilege to be featured on Ande Lyons’ podcast, Don’t Be Caged by Your Age, discussing positive aging and my new book, The AfterWork: Finding Fulfilling Alternatives to Retirement. See and hear video.

Sir Isaac Newton’s third law of motion states that every action upon an object generates an equal and opposite reaction. A recent proof of the postulate is the action of “bucket lists” - things one intends to do before kicking the bucket. The equal and opposite reaction is the emergence of the “anti-bucket list” – things one never wants to experience again.

Number one on my anti-bucket list is wearing a necktie. Nevermore! Finis! Never again will I tie the knot!

I take this stand not to stick a thumb in the eye of convention, as satisfying as that may be, but as a matter of personal health. Simply put, I am no longer willing to constrict the flow of oxygen to my brain. I need all the oxygen I can get.

Growth in Girth

I had no trouble wearing a tie every day in my early 20s as a neophyte newspaper reporter. Back then, it was no problem to affix a tie after fastening the top button of a medium shirt with a15-inch neck. Over the years, though, my neckline expanded, and the shirt became impossible to button at the neck without risking a faint. I scaled up to 15 1/2-inch necks, then 16-inch, and finally 17-inch. When the 17-inch became nearly impossible to fasten, I was out of options in the ready-made shirt market. Shirts with 18-inch necks also have sleeves that reach my knees.

The continuous expansion of the neckline seems to be a family tradition. Both my brothers have a similar issue. So does my son, a lawyer who is obligated by his profession to wear the tie daily. But it may explain something about our shared heritage. Our last name is a Yiddish word that means “stubborn,” generally used as an expletive. I have always assumed that our ancestor who gifted us this name earned it through incredible obstinacy. But the Yiddish term derives from a Hebrew word that literally means “stiff-necked.” Now I’m starting to wonder if our ancestor earned his appellation because of a physical trait, passed down to us via DNA.

In considering my relationship with the necktie, I became curious about where it came from in the first place, and how it got to be de regueur for men of a certain social standing. Did George Washington wear one? Did Lincoln? (Short answer: no.)

The Origin Story

According to reliable sources (i.e., Wikipedia), the ancestor of the modern necktie, and the bowtie for that matter, was a small, knotted neckerchief worn by Croatian mercenaries who were fighting for France during the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648). The Croatians called themselves hrvati, while the French called them Croates. Smash them together and you get cravat. King Louis XIV, the fashion-forward monarch even in his childhood, began wearing a lace cravat at the age of 7, and nobility promptly followed suit, wearing cravats or jabots, a fancier, pleated or ruffled neckerchief. Sometimes cravats were tied in a bow, making them the ancestors of bowties.

Skip ahead two centuries, to the mid-1800s, and the men of the Industrial Age needed neckwear that was easy to wear, comfortable, and unlikely to get caught in machinery or come apart at inopportune moments. Voila! An English tailoring company designed the necktie style that is still worn today in Western nations.

Necktie usage has been declining steadily, although it enjoyed a brief revival in the 1970s thanks entirely to Diane Keaton (R.I.P.) in the movie Annie Hall.

As for me, retirement means never having to play dress up for work, and that means foreswearing the ties that bind me to corporate style. Now that I am not required to maintain an illusion of professionalism, I find myself unwilling to wear one, even on those few occasions – funerals, worship, state dinners – when one seems appropriate. This year, for the first time, I celebrated the Jewish High Holy Days sans tie. I may face God’s judgment on any number of failings, but I doubt I will be judged on my fashion sense.

Similarly, while I once wore ties to funerals as a sign of respect for the deceased, it now occurs to me that the deceased is beyond caring whether I show respect in my choice of dress.

State dinners have not been an issue to date.

Now that I have one item on my anti-bucket list, what should I add? Any suggestions?