: feets don’t fail me now :

For a long time I’ve been scared of Doc Martens. They’re intimidating shoes with their thick soles and ominous yellow stitching. They had a bad attitude, you know? A reputation. I’d find myself staring at anyone brave enough to wear them and try to guess what they did for a living. Tattoo artist was a common hunch, there was a tormented poet, an avant-garde caterer, a bounty hunter, a dog breeder, and an aromatherapist. Not one near-sighted, middle-aged woman in the bunch.

Of course, I wasn’t always middle-aged; I was young once. For a minute. Even then I was more of a tennis shoes and loafers type. On rare occasions, I wore heels. Oh, and those little black flats, I loved those. These days fashion isn’t the priority when I go shopping, comfort is. The cute shoes, the elegant heels, they don’t make it out of the closet like they used to. They’re relegated to the back where they’re busy gathering dust and hoping for a return to the front. I haven’t told them, but that’s not likely to happen. Their best days are behind them.

Sadly, my feet’s best days seem to be history, too. Old favorites, shoes I’ve loved and worn happily, have turned on me. They squash my toes together, they cramp my feet and crush my instep, they leave bruises on my toes. Why are they doing this? Do feet bear grudges?

Finally, at the urging of a friend, I reluctantly tried a pair of Docs, the least intimidating pair in the store. They look like chukka boots, only leather. I tried the brown ones, brown seemed friendlier. And, what do you know, they were comfortable. They weren’t heavy or clunky, they were just shoes and they fit. You could’ve knocked me over with a feather — I expected them to be big and awkward and way too heavy to lift. They were none of those things. I looked at the price and, again, you could’ve knocked me over with a feather. Wow, they’re expensive, but I’m told they’ll last forever.

Now that I have a decent pair of shoes I can wear without limping, I wonder what my feet are up to. I mean, come on, they can’t go all Sasquatch on me now, I still need them. We have places to go and things to do. We still have some asses to kick and names to take. Feets don’t fail me now.

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