Luv Doc: Drop Crotch

Dear Luv Doc,

I have always been proud that my guy is fashion-forward. He is now in his early 30s, but he still keeps up with fashion trends, and he has always been willing to experiment with his hair and his clothing. Sometimes it's my idea, but he gets a lot of ideas from magazines, etc., too. Usually, I am pleased with his taste, and when I like something I tell him so. A few years back he started wearing drop-crotch joggers. They were not my favorite, but I didn't say anything at the time because I thought they would go out of style before I got too sick of them; now it's been more than two years and he keeps buying them and has even added drop-crotch jeans and slacks(?) to his collection. They seem to be his favorite pants. I can't stand to look at him below the waist anymore and I have tried to encourage him to wear regular pants, but other than suits or office clothing, drop-crotch pants are the only thing he wears. How do I get him out of his favorite pants?

– Lady Longcrotch

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Let me start by saying that I have way too much experience changing diapers to weigh in objectively on this argument. Any time I see a pants crotch hanging just above the knees, I get the thousand-yard stare of a dad with a gastronomically adventurous toddler. I think: "You don't want to go in there. Just act like nothing is wrong and maybe somebody else will notice the smell first."

Here's the thing: They never do. If there isn't an indignant in-law/CPS social worker nearby, no experienced father is going to acknowledge that a toddler's diaper needs changing – even if said diaper is dragging a wet trail across the floor and makes the entire room/shopping mall/airplane hangar smell like a ruptured sewer main.

I once endured an extremely awkward, painfully long conversation standing in the Reed Park kiddie pool with another father while we both fought with all our might to ignore what can only be described as a morally offensive, unholy stench. I finally broke down and asked if the other father smelled what I was smelling and he said, "I thought it might have been my kid's diaper," to which I replied, "I thought it might have been my kid's diaper." We both let out a nervous laugh and begrudgingly went to verify our presumptions. Finding neither child to be the source of the stench, we snatched them out of that pool as quickly as possible. It turned out that there actually was a ruptured sewer pipe near the pool, but here is the important point: Not one parent was making a fuss about it, and there were plenty of children. People were just going about their business like everything was normal.

Nobody wants to be responsible – even tangentially – for an atrocity, and even if they are, they damn sure don't want to clean it up. The same is true of fashion. One day someone wakes up and thinks, "Oh my God! Why am I wearing these heavy-ass cargo shorts? Am I an extra in The Bridge on the River Kwai?" That's when all the finger-pointing begins. Finger shoes? Fanny packs? Deep V-neck T-shirts? Of course, I could go on, but you motherfuckers knew what you were doing. You were ignoring the stench.

The difficult conversations we don't have are often the ones that alter the course of our lives. You need to talk to your man. You need to let him know that no matter how deep his fear of rocking an eye-popping moose knuckle, it's still not a good enough excuse to look like a toddler who just dropped a huge shit bomb in his Pull-Ups. If that's fashion forward, he needs to throw it hard into reverse.