Tuesday, July 15, 2014

Soleless.

A fact about me and my life is that I hate shoes.

I had a roommate for a long while who loved shoes. She had a gorgeous collection of high heels and we loved playing in them. On a quiet evening, if we were bored and needed an activity to do, we would put all of her shoes in little rows and try each pair on while wandering/strutting around the bedroom and looking at how fantabulous our calves looked in the mirror (fun fact: my computer accepts "fantabulous" as a word. How neato is that? (Update: "neato" is not accepted.)). This activity I super enjoyed, because my legs looked awesome in those heels and I felt pretty and fancy.

Outside of the house, and beyond mirrors that I can admire my legs in, my love for shoes abruptly ends. In attempting to walk in heels I usually feel like a baby giraffe struggling to walk for the first time. Any other shoe that covers my feet up completely has me imagining my feet as victims to a kidnapping, one which includes a smothering chloroform soaked cloth-hug just for good measure. Sandals are the most acceptable form of footwear, however they seem like a lie: "Hey look, your feet are free-HA JUST KIDDING, YOU ARE TRAPPED FOREVER!"

Thus, my footsies have the daily uniform of being bare or in soft soled ballet slippers. The wonderful thing about ballet slippers is that you feel like you're not wearing shoes. The terrible thing about ballet slippers is that they get holes in the soles incredibly easily. The pair I have now have come apart from the sole just under each toe-pad (there's probably another name for such the thing). Peter and I have both agreed I need new shoes, but ughhh gag me with a spoon!

I wholly despise the act of shoe shopping. Sometime last year I was in a Payless waiting for a friend to try on some fun heels. I decided to try passing the time by measuring my feet in the little metal contraptions that store assistants like to force you into when you're little and easily forced into such things. I tried to measure myself over and over again in some sort of metallic hokey-pokey, placing my left foot in, and my right foot in, and eventually shaking it all about, (because that IS what it's all about). I finally called a shop assistant over for help because I couldn't seem to get it right - I was reading each foot as an entire shoe size apart.

She instructed me from afar, seemingly too afraid to get too close to my feet, which is kind of strange to me, cause YOU WORK IN A SHOE STORE, LADY, COME FACE YOUR FEAR OF TOES AND HELP ME. When she finally did she agreed - my feet were an entire shoe size different. My left reading at a 7.5 and my right at a 8.5.

This fact does explain why, in addition to my baby giraffe walking, heels have always been so difficult for me. I could never find a pair to stay on my feet, but instead one would squeeze and the other would flop, meaning I have to tense my foot and leg muscles in the most peculiar way in a hope to keep both shoes on both feet and the same time, resulting in a very "yesss masterrrrr?" minion-esque drag-shuffle approach to walking.

Luckily, I live in Hawaii. Shoes are never required here. I am free for a year more.

 
Peter doesn't share my hatred for shoes. We're more interesting than you ever thought!!

3 comments:

  1. I walk around in socks...mostly because my feet are cold and mostly because of my Hawaii-upbringing which involved a shoeless childhood (not that my mother didn't fully try to make it shoed). Here's a suggestion on your shoe-size problem: my uncle had the same problem, so he would take one shoe from one size and one shoe from another size. This was incredibly helpful to anyone shopping after him provided they had the same problem in the same sizes but on opposite feet. :)

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  2. We are the same. I've never realized before what my feelings towards shoe shopping were, but it's hate. It seems like a crazy lot of money to spend and I always end up destroying them in a few days somehow. My face gets all red I end up settling because they don't have what I want because what I want is for no shoes ever...

    We've got a saying in preschool, "No shoes, no fun" and we have to say it because it's a safety thing for them, and also hard for us to keep track of shoes when they all take them off. But one little Korean girl, 2 years old, she can't understand me either... she takes her shoes off and I put them back on and usually that sends a signal that she needs to keep them on but she takes them off again anyways! I've quit trying because honestly I don't want to wear shoes either, seems wrong to force others to do something I don't believe in myself.

    Also barefeet. I have hecka ugly feet because I wanted "leather feet" as a kid, meaning the bottoms of my feet would be as thick as soles of shoes and tah-dah, now they are.... And then I danced barefoot at our wedding too because shoes are dumb.

    TL;DR I'm gonna blog about all this. Stay tuned.

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    Replies
    1. Shoes are terrible. I want hobbit feet. I mean, not with the hair, but with the toughness.

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