For nearly 2 1/2 years, I have been on an epic quest. A quest, for a hat. And I’m here to tell you, my friends, at long last my quest is at an end.

Way back in June of 2012, I told you I was looking for a new hat. I needed something to protect the baby pink smoothness of my vast, vast bald spot from the ravages of the sun, but I felt like maybe I was finally too old for a ballcap.

Since that time I have quested ceaselessly for said hat. I mean CEASELESSLY. I have tried every possible kind of hat on god’s green earth. I have looked online, in department stores, in outdoor stores, at hat stores, basically any time I was in a store that sold hats, I tried them on.

When I try on a hat, I just feel dumb, like everybody is looking at me going “Whoa, look at that dude! Who does he think he is?” I just feel like I can’t pull it off. All of the hats imply a certain “look” and I just don’t have it. I don’t know what kind of look I have, but I guess they just don’t make a hat for me. And I didn’t want to spend the money on a hat and not wear it, so I just kept looking.

Until the other day, when I bought this fedora:

Now, just to be clear, I cannot pull off this hat. But I saw it, it wasn’t worse than any other hat I saw, and it was on clearance. Done.

Mainly I was just tired of the whole, endless search. It’s clear that I was never going to find a hat that looked good on me, so it was either buy a hat that’s not going to look good on me, or not buy a hat. However, I decided then and there that if I was going to buy it, then I was going to own it. No leaving it home because it looks dumb on me, no taking it off quick if I see somebody I know, no hiding it. If a two-tone blue striped fedora wasn’t my look before, it is now.

Basically, I’m relying on the fact that the key to “pulling it off” is just pulling it off. I’m going to wear that thing with confidence, and any funny looks I get, imagined or otherwise, can go find someone else to bother. That’s the kind of guy I am.

A fedora kind of guy.