An Open Letter to Ben Sherman

Dear Ben,

I suppose there's never a real easy way to bring up these kind of things. Sometimes it's best just to treat them like a band-aid and just pull it off and deal with a sharp, quick pain than a agonizing, prolonged one. So here it is: you've changed, and I don't like it one bit.

I can easily remember the first time we met. You were at Purr in Calgary, the old location, the one with the mens section upstairs. You looked so cool, and as soon as I got to know you I knew we'd be friends forever. I'd heard about you from other friends and acquaintances, you were a bit of a legend truth be told. Everyone seemed to know you, rock stars and footballers down to all my friends. You seemed to share a mutual appreciation amongst everyone.

You were the type of cool that can't be faked. You so often see these clueless twats, chasing fashions around each and every week. But you had the classic cool. The kind that comes with confidence and self belief. Not one to just do what everyone else had decided was cool. You were the personification of that very word.

But somewhere along the way, you lost your way. You started making new friends, being influenced by some trendy twats. It was a little hard to believe at first. When you first started experimenting with them, we all figured it was just that: experimentation. Things can get a little stale in a friendship after awhile, so we decided to let you go ahead and do what you thought you needed to do.

You kept coming back, although the experimentation seemed to be becoming a bit more entrenched as time went on. Then one day I woke up and realized it wasn't just experimentation anymore. You had become everything you were so against in the past. It's like you forgot what made everyone like you in the first place.

Now you were trying to keep company with a bunch of dodgy Italians and Frenchmen. Shoulda known something was up when you seemingly lost your interest in women a few years back. But time doesn't move backwards, it only moves forward. In a way I think you might be thinking that's what your doing.

But you're not, and it's time you realized it. Instead all you've done is hurt and anger a bunch of your old friends in pursuit of your new ones. But they're all fake, and you'll see how quickly they leave you behind. For them there is always something new, something more exciting. Something they've been hyped up by the media into thinking is cool. That was never you, and they're going to figure it out. You can hide what you are.

The worst part might be you've started using us. You couldn't seem to care about most of the time, then you need money. So you use us and our name for a couple of quick bucks. But you don't care. Not any more. Before we were friends on equal terms, albeit we admired you a bit more than we think was every really reciprocated. Now in an odd way it's turned around, and you've decided making money off our name was what you want to do.

The sad part is I know just how foolish I am, and a lot of your old friends are. When you finally get your head on straight again we'll end up welcoming you back with open arms. I suppose that's what friends do. One never wants to believe they've truly lost a once important friend until they're gone forever. And none of us want to see that day. So we'll wait, on baited breath, hoping for you to return to your former glory. Til then we've made new friends, people who seem to care more than perhaps you ever did. They're just not as great as you once were. But then again, neither are you.

With sadness,

Van Cleef.