DON'T GET SHIRTY

With the first peek of summer comes the inevitable tutting about men walking around without a top on. Oliver Keens has had enough, and gets his feelings off his (bare) chest

- Oliver Keens

Hello. My name is Oliver Keens and I am the quintessential topless guy in your community. At the very moment rays of consistent sunlight start to appear in spring, I am the first middle-aged man in the park, blanket laid out, pathetically turning himself around every six minutes like a shish kebab on a grill, trying to get a covering that is deep and crisp and even. Fake tan is not my bag, tanning salons can do one: this isn’t about vanity or beauty, I just want sun, and plenty of it. And you can tell this because I take my top off in the sunshine – a lot.

The trouble is, there’s a palpable air of disquiet around being a topless middle-aged man. For example, every summer a tabloid tut-tut fest breaks out, bemoaning the sight of lumpy topless men in the park, lumpy topless men on the high street, or the hygiene issues of men being lumpy and topless in Tesco – as though we don’t let dogs, forever with their sweet wet noses in other dog’s anal glands, into stores to sniff at the onions. Self-appointed etiquette experts such as William Hanson – a proudly conservative dresser who gives profound William Hague energy and hosts the popular Help I Sexted My Boss podcast – are typically asked to give their views, mostly delivered with eyes closed, lips pouting and prefaced with a stiff shake of the head as if to say “no no no”.