If I had to pick one pair or pants that truly represented America, I think I’d have to say: jeans.
Jeans are rugged. Jeans are brash. Jeans are unique. Cowboys wear jeans.
When other pants get in a mess, leaving you in the cold, who do you call on to wear to save your ass? Jeans.
When you’ve got a dirty, thankless job to do, and you know full well going into it that you’re going to cause great harm to your clothes, who’s there for you, ready for the challenge, again and again? Jeans, by God.
Jeans are what apple pie and baseball would feel like if you could wrap them around your legs. Jeans are what the whole world wants to wear constantly but doesn’t want to admit it. Jeans put a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage.
Jeans take your tired, your poor, your huddle masses yearning to be free and give ’em a Coke and a smile. Give me jeans, or give me death. I hold my jeans to be self evident. Jeans do not discriminate based on race, creed or color. Oh, say, does that blue-denimed banner yet wave, o’er the land of the jeans and the home of the brave? Yes, it does, God damn it. Yes, it does.
Jeans are you. Jeans are me. Jeans. Are. America.
Sadly, here of late, my jeans have gotten more and more constricting, and seem to really ride up my buttcrack these days.