The ties that bind

On Monday - as I'm sure you'll be aware from the ample coverage in this week's paper - SUR in English celebrated its fortieth anniversary with an event in Marbella. I was lucky enough to be invited and accepted gladly, knowing that I would be able to give my second-best shirt an outing, the best having been employed for a Cudeca event only seven days earlier. Unfortunately, the gods of sartorial elegance had other ideas. The second-best shirt in question had somehow acquired an inexplicable dark stain on the left shoulder simply by hanging in the wardrobe for the last five hundred or so years. I had no option but to put on the Cudeca shirt again, although I was sure I could get away with it simply by lurking in the shadows and avoiding being photographed.

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Unfortunately, however, there was another, more pressing, hurdle to overcome - the classic tie conundrum. Should I wear one or not? Reasons for doing so: it would be polite and a show of respect for all concerned. Reasons for not doing so: I haven't got one.

Thus, I took the no-tie option and, boy, it was tense. The first colleagues to arrive – Karl Smallman and Tony Bryant – were, quite clearly each wearing a tie. I complimented them through gritted teeth while glancing over their shoulders like those very rude people at parties looking to see if anybody more interesting is entering the room. In fact, I was merely searching for a bit of open-neck shirt solidarity and, luckily, David Andrews soon stepped into the fray, top shirt button undone. Phew! Oh, hang on, he's just whipped a dickie-bow out of his jacket pocket. A dickie-bow! Man, I'm in trouble now - this is a whole other level of tie shenanigans.

Ah but no, wait a minute, not so fast – here comes Neil Hesketh, a lovely man. Head boy at his school, I believe, and very definitely not wearing a tie. God bless you, sir. Up next, the German contingent and not even the faintest whiff of a tie among them. German culture has its failings, of course (Alphaville, pretzels, Wim Wenders, etc.) but informality is not one of them. Magically, the room seemed to be filling with a vast array of men, all with their top buttons undone and all yelling 'I'm Spartacus!', although it's possible that last bit might have been my imagination. Anyway, as the night - marvellously organised by Rachel Haynes and her team – drew to a close, I left as I had arrived – head held high, utterly tieless and endlessly grateful.

*Footnote – a big thank-you to former editor Liz Parry who first gave me an opportunity to write for this paper (with no previous experience or training whatsoever) more than twenty years ago. No interview, no tie.