I’ve never claimed to be the most fashionable fellow. I suppose just the fact that I use words like ‘fellow’ probably gives me away. I’ve never been too concerned with following the latest fashion trends. I’ve never cared too much about being up to date on the latest tastes.

This lack of caring about fashion manifests itself in many different ways. The most obvious is in my clothing choices. You won’t catch me wearing the latest threads. What you’ll catch me wearing is pretty much the same thing I was wearing last year and the year before and ten years before that. As far as clothing goes, my fashion is pretty much ageless, but only in the sense that there never was an age in which my fashion choices were vaguely in.

This applies similarly to other aspects of life that go in and out of fashion. Whether it’s music or TV shows or food, I refuse to go along with whatever is popular. I like what I like. As far as music or TV, I can at least say that my choices were once popular, but you’d need to go back quite a while to pinpoint the exact time when this was so. And as for food, I’m pretty old school. Basic regional cuisines, like Italian or Thai or Indian or Mexican work for me. I don’t need any modern twist. Just keep it simple and traditional and it works for me.

But the major way my lack of interest in fashion is expressed is through the stories I write. I have no interest in the latest trend in literature, whether it’s vampires or domestic noir or whatever else is currently hot in the bookstores. I just want to write my own stories, my own way. If that doesn’t put me up in the vanguard of bestsellers, then so be it.

You may say that when it comes to keeping up with fashion, I run more than a little behind the times. I like to see it another way. I’m actually running way up ahead. So far ahead that I’ve just about lapped fashion. I’ve done a full circuit of the fashion stakes and am now coming up behind. My disdain for whatever it is that is trendy has allowed me to move so far ahead of the pack that it’s creating this illusion I’m running hard just to keep up.

Who knows how it will end up. If I keep on running, maybe I’ll fully lap fashion. Maybe we’ll be running neck and neck. And maybe then, the rest of the world will catch on to all the things I’m doing.