There's been an awful lot of arguing and fighting on this board recently. I have to admit that I've played a role, dishing up a couple of doozies about hose and shoes that I think are unconscionably expensive.

So I'd like to say this....

This place is about kilts. It's come to represent more than that, because of the greater associations: Kilts and Scotland and Scottish history....kilts and alternative lifestyles...kilts and craftsmanship (craftswomanship?? ) and so on. But at it's core, this web forum is a place to celebrate something...

...Wearing a garment which has its roots in a traditional Scottish garment, called the kilt....

So it seems to me that when we read something here that we disagree with, each one of us ought to scratch our heads and think a moment....how important is that issue that lights our fuse, REALLY? Is it really worth a hard comment?

I participate in another online forum that's very different from this one. I've been there for ten-plus years. I've learned the hard way that people will do what they're going to do, no matter what I tell them. They will do the STUPIDEST things. That reality transfers here. No matter how many times I rant on about expensive socks, if someone on this forum wants to wear expensive socks, they're going to wear them. I'm not going to change anybody by what I say on this forum. I can share what works for me, and praise what I think looks good, but making hard comments and ranting doesn't work.

So I'm going to not rant for a while, in fact for a good while. In fact, I'm going to look for things to praise in those with whom I often disagree, and write good stuff about what they choose to wear, or in some manner in which they helped me learn something. And I'm going to start right here, and right now.

I sometimes disagree with Chef over the rightness or wrongness of those expensive socks! But Chef took the time to point out what "ghillie flaps" were, to me, and that I might consider the possibility of dressing up a pair of military brogues with a set of those. I had no idea what ghillie flaps were. Thanks Chef. And you know what? Chef looks pretty darned sharp in that new IoS kilt he's got.

I'm gonna choose to opt to say positive things, whenever I possibly can, for a while. I'm going to choose to celebrate the good things I experience while trotting around in my life with a kilt on, and there ya go.