Sour Mood

I just had my senior picture taken (for the yearbook). As I'm not too keen on posing for snapshots, I approached the affair with a bit of boredom.

After waiting on line (that's right, not in line) for an unnecessary amount of time I finally took my seat beneath the harsh lights.

The woman who was to take my picture asked me to kindly remove the piece of paper I had in my suit's breast pocket. Of course, it wasn't a piece of paper. It was a handkerchief (I wear it as a pocket square, folding and positioning it so that a thin white horizontal strip sticks up and out of my pocket).

Her ignorant suggestion immediately put me in a foul mood. She is a professional photographer. Has she never seen a man wear a pocket square? Has she never even seen a movie wherein men wear pocket squares?

I fault her and this culture of ours. What is the breast pocket for if not to house a handkerchief or pocket square? Must a pocket be purely utilitarian?