The Issue of Shoes
As a child I was expected to polish my shoes the night before Sunday School; applied with a stiff and smelly, greasy cloth and buffed with a large rectangle brush that was almost too big for my little hand to hold on to.
Before school started each fall, we got new shoes at a real shoe store- always burgundy mary janes, the buckles of which dug into the top of my foot-. Mr Snyder, a sweet distinguished man with greying hair and mustache, wearing dark suit and tie and smelling of pipe tobacco, fitted us. He sat on a stool with attached footrest and a special ruler for measuring length and width of foot for a proper fit. The leather soles on those shoes were lethal on the carpet at Sunday school as we ran about collecting electricity to shock ourselves on the coat hooks, often landing on our butts as though running on glare ice. Shoes that needed new soles were taken to the cobbler.
Converse Sneakers had a warehouse in a nearby town where we could get seconds at a discount. Our annual trip to get the five of us outfitted took forever, the smell of rubber making me nauseous. I did not want ugly converse sneakers- I wanted Keds or PF Flyers that made you run super fast and came with a secret decoder ring. One Thanksgiving I was wearing the hideous black canvas boat shoes that signalled the end of any dream I might have had of wearing fashionable shoes. We were playing tag in the side yard with our cousins and I twisted my ankle on a pile of dog doo, which became so ground into the fabric that there was no getting it completely out. I actually thought that this would my ticket to a new pair of sneakers, but alas, those odiferous monstrosities followed me into the next summer along with their faint stench of dog shit.
That was the year that I was no longer able to get the shoe boots that had become so popular in the sixties, and I was relegated to wearing my brothers outgrown black rubber boots with the metal buckles and caked on mud. I wanted to crawl under a rock. It was probably just as well.
When I was in 3rd grade, I was late for church and didn’t take the time to pee before trudging downtown in a blizzard. It was one of the first days I was to sing in the children’s choir, and as I hurriedly tripped up the steps to the immense wooden doors, my bladder let loose. Not only did I wet my beautiful new stretch ski pants that looped under my feet and looked so great with the yellow turtleneck I was wearing, the only pair of lined shoe boots I ever owned filled with the hot smelly liquid, the odor of which ruined any pleasure of having something fashionable for once in my life.
In 6th grade (1968, the peak of fashion), and the last time I went to Snyders Shoe Store, all he had to offer in my size 10 superwide was saddle shoes dating back to the 50’s. During recess I was the laughing stock as my classmates pretended to be my friends so they could take turns scuffing around the playground in my “giant old fashioned clown” shoes.
In high school while staying with my sister in the Boston area, my brother-in law became disgusted by the sight of my shoes and bought me my first pair of Dr.Scholl’s sandals. For once I was the one to start a trend. I was so sad when one of them became lost on the steep embankment over Sand Beach at Acadia as I tumbled down the hillside during a seizure. Thankfully I was able to replace them, if only to have that brand of shoe permanently revoked after a fall down a long flight of stairs during another seizure.
Next came the clunky sensible shoes-shit kickers; followed by the LL Bean “duck” boots with no traction. But we did live in Maine after all and I was not alone. By then it had become so DEPRESSING to go shoe shopping, I was content to leave it at that for years. The only difference between me and my cohorts was that they got out their pretty summer shoes and sandals when the weather warmed.
I did get one pair of dress shoes after that; though at six feet tall, the only pair I was able to acquire for a stint as my best friend’s maid of honor was a pair of 4” wedges. As we sat having lunch at the reception, the best man leaned over and said “Boy am I glad you’re sitting down; I thought you were going to get a nosebleed up there!”
That was 40 years ago, and the only pair of shoes I have had since that wasn’t my typical clunkers was shoes for my own wedding- a gigantic $12 pair of ballet slippers!!]