Polo

Polo, undeniably, is a sport played by and for wealthy white people.  The markers of class and attainment which surround it are clear, if not always entirely flagrant.  And no doubt where there exists that aura of material ascendancy there will exist as well all the striving, scrambling and jockeying that constitutes a rather breathless game in itself, a kind of unctuous polo of the audience.  Hence the (often justified) cliches of pretension and debauchery that pervade many of our conceptions of affluence.

But.  But.  Having yesterday attended a real-live, honest-to-God polo match, I feel compelled to offer a theory of at least one way in which it might not be entirely indefensible to exist in this otherwise ridiculous realm of excess and ostentation.  And it has to do with boots.

How much do the boots these polo players were wearing cost?  $700?  $900?  Who knows.  Conceivably enough to pay rent for two months in most mid-sized Midwestern cities.  Enough to offend the sensibilities of most everyone I grew up with.

But here's the thing: nobody who's ever played polo buys them because they cost that much.  Rather, they buy them because they're worth that much.  Stand next to a man standing next to his polo pony, as we did yesterday, and you'll realize what a sophisticated bit of equipment he's wearing on his feet.  The zipper, in the classic Argentine design, is on the front and covered with flaps:

Or, sometimes the boot is even covered with "over-chaps" to prevent wear from rubbing against stirrup irons, or the rider's horse, or his opponent's horse should there be contact:

And about that contact--it is repeated and sustained, these boots must endure the press and grate of horse hair, the seep of horse sweat.  These boots, magnificent though they are, are not show pieces.  Rather, they are made in anticipation of mud, salt, shit, and yes, frequently spilled beer or gin.  They are something that seems to have become strangely rare in our time: they are both beautiful and used.

Now, what the brief and rather tame essay above is not, is an unqualified apology for the aristocratic classes such as they continue to exist here in Northern Virginia, or wherever they might be lurking in the Western world.  Rather, it is a proposition.  I know from my own experience that what might smack of pretension to some is in fact experienced as an earnest and profound engagement by others.  I know that when I wonder out loud about some abstruse question, say, whether or not Chinese trade and investment in sub-Saharan Africa constitutes a 21st-Century reincarnation of colonialism, I'm not doing so in order to impress anybody (because, really, who would ever be impressed by that question?); I'm actually thinking about it.  And though we do well always to keep a wry eye on our own aspirations, whether they be aspirations to eloquence, expertise, gentility, or what-have-you, we need nevertheless to be free to aspire fully, desperately even.  If we are not thusly free, if we allow our skepticism to inhibit our curiosity, or allow our instincts toward moral disapprobation to overwhelm our patience, then we risk missing so much and being the unhappier for it.  As you can see below, Nina and I, deeply in touch with our own pretensions, had a blast at that polo match.