Brian Lairer on WNYC.

We're going to end the drive with a little bit of fun each of the next few days with a short form series about how to find your personal style.

We will bring you wisdom from a few

well-dressed people, if you want to call them that, who think seriously about clothes and who

understand the history and meaning behind the clothes we choose and why we wear what we wear. And we're

starting close to home, our colleague James Ramsey, digital producer and author of the early edition newsletter

for the WNYC and Gothamist Newsroom, joins me today because he recently admitted to a long-running

aspiration. Hey, James. Hi, Brian. I don't know if I qualify as well-dressed, but I admire those who

are, so I'm qualified enough to talk on the topic. So what was that long-running aspiration?

The long-running aspiration has been to be the kind of person who wears dress shoes to work.

And I haven't quite gotten there, but I haven't given up on it either.

I aspire to be the kind of person who wears running shoes to work.

So why dress shoes?

Why dress shoes?

Well, I guess it goes back because it is a, I think of it as a very adult and dignified uh aspirational way of

caring yourself for this for me this sort of goes back i moved here um at the age of 21 uh like

a lot of people you know you moved to new york city right after college and it kind of marks

really the the real start of your adult life and And I was coming from, you know, for

contacts, I moved around as a kid, but I was coming from San Diego, California, which is a

beautiful place, and the people are lovely, and people with graduate degrees all dress like

they're on their way to a swimming lesson. And so I had it in my head that I was going to come to New York and I was going to have a little more of a dressed up, like I said, kind of dignified way of carrying myself.

Now, listeners, we don't have too much time for calls in this segment, but we have a little.

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