When I first graduated from college my grandmother gave me a pair of cufflinks for men. I didn’t really understand why she would give me this gift since I had went to school to become a teacher and didn’t really intend to wear a suit to work everyday. It was about a year after my graduation when my grandmother asked me why she had never seen me wear the cufflinks she had given me. I didn’t want to be rude, so I replied as nicely as I could. I simply told her that I loved the gift she and given me and that I would cherish it always, but I did not really have a use of cufflinks. What she said next shocked me.

She told me that if I did not have a use for cufflinks it was because I was still a boy and not a man. I was more than a little offended by this, and I am quite sure that she could see that in my face. She continued by saying that cufflinks for men were not merely a fashion accessory, but they were a sign of your status in life and your maturity level. I respectfully disagreed with her and walked away before the conversation could get any deeper.

I tried to forget what my grandmother had said, and chalk up her opinion to a difference in generational opinion. I however, couldn’t help but begin to notice what kind of men I saw wearing cufflinks. It seemed that my grandmother was right after all. The men that I would see wearing cufflinks were all men who seemed to hold status or importance in their community. They weren’t all highly paid executives, some were pastors and even the principal at the school were I was teaching. These men gave the impression that they took their jobs and their futures seriously without ever speaking a word. The way that they presented themselves spoke volumes about the kind of man that they were.

I began to wear the personalised cufflinks that my grandmother had given me to formal events and meetings. I saw the way that people approached me begin to change. They were no longer treating me like a boy, and began treating me like a true man. I still didn’t feel completely comfortable wearing the cufflinks that my grandmother had bought for me, so I began shopping around. Once I found out that their were cufflinks for men in all different styles, I was sold. I now own a different set of cufflinks for every suit I own.