Back-to-school clothes shopping was always a minefield. I remember trying to anticipate an entire identity on a sweaty August afternoon at the mall without any way of telling what the rest of the masses were going to look like (while also operating on a no-Abercrombie-unless-you’re-paying-for-it budget). One particularly frustrating example: another summer of buying basketball shorts and various AND1 tops at Bargain Barn with various slogans (Don’t Apologize—Your Game Is Sorry Enough) only to arrive at school and every kid was dressed like Owen Wilson in Midnight In Paris. When did we all agree to start wearing brown shoes? Rugby shirts? Literally anything with a button? Cologne? Cologne! I swear to God I met a kid that year who had a pair of driving gloves.
