Several years ago, I went to a department store to buy a bathing suit. The salesperson asked, “Do you want a Tommy?” I said, “No, I just want a bathing suit.” He explained that he meant a Tommy Hilfiger bathing suit. He had assumed that any dumb cluck would know what a “Tommy” was. Bad assumption.

Brand name clothing has never caught my fancy. I’m a clothes mule, not a clothes horse. When I was working in advertising in New York City in the late ’60s, one of my fellow workers wanted to stop by a Brooks Brothers store after lunch. He said the word “Brooks Brothers” like a baseball fan might have whispered the names of Babe Ruth or Joe DiMaggio. Maybe that’s why I spent less than a year in advertising, a field in which image or, in today’s lingo, branding is all.

I came by my disdain for following the latest clothing trend naturally. My brilliant but often clueless dad would head off to a weeklong national bridge tournament toting a briefcase, not a suitcase. He claimed that he could wash his underwear out in the sink and let it dry over night.

While more careful with her appearance, my mother would never have said, “All I want for Christmas is a Gucci shoulder bag.” She would have said (rightly), “If I had that kind of money I’d give it to the poor.” Incidentally, she would not have been impressed by a man who gave his kids names like “Tiffany” or “Baron” or had gold-plated fixtures installed in his bathroom or wore platform heels to look taller.

In fairness, I had my fashion moments: a charcoal and pink sport coat in the ’50s; bell-bottom pants in the ’70s and … oops, that’s about it. During my first year in college, I put my white shirts and underwear right in there with a red shirt. Why pay for two loads? Voila. Pink! There’s a picture of me in the wedding party at my former college roommate’s wedding. All the tuxedo-clad ushers were wearing black shoes, but the one who favored brown for that special occasion. Moi.

What got me thinking about this topic was an article in the New York Times entitled, “Vuitton, Chanel, Who Cares?” by a longtime fashion editor, critic and lecturer. She noted that the prices of the famous luxury brands have skyrocketed in recent years, while the quality has declined. Moreover, many luxury-brand products were now being sold at mid-level stores or even discount stores, so that just anyone could by them now. Horror of horrors!

As an example, she reported that Chanel’s iconic 2.55 leather flap bag, which cost $5,800 in 2019 will now set you back $10,800. Forgive me, but who on earth would ever spend $5,800 for a bag, let alone $10,800?

Speaking of outrageous, the article on Vuitton and Chanel noted that the prix fixe menu at the exclusive restaurant Sublimotion at Ibiza in Spain has gone up from $1,675 a head in 2022 to $2,380 a head today.

It would be tempting to veer off into a rant about today’s gilded times when billionaires make the rules and the world’s elite are granted special accommodations for anything their entitled hearts desire. Rather, I’ll try to wear clean clothes (most of the time) and put on socks that match and not embarrass my wife too much. But never ask me where I got this or that piece of clothing. I won’t know the answer and, to be honest, I won’t care.

David Treadwell, a Brunswick writer, welcomes commentary and suggestions for future “Just a Little Old” columns at dtreadw575@aol.com.