ALL THE SHOES I’VE EVER OWNED
or DO BABIES WEAR SHOES? or A BRIEF HISTORY OF MY LIFE: FOOTWEAR or, if you must have a fourth, HOW I LEARNED TO STOP BEING BAREFOOT AND WEAR SHOES
(Medium, with its limited options for creators, is unable to format this piece the way I envision it. If you find it imperfect or hard to follow it is either your fault or Medium’s, not mine, as I have a clear vision for how it ought to be laid out, and I can assure you if we could do it my way there would be no complaints.)
I’m not a curious person, but when curiosity does strike it comes in obsessive pangs that tend not to matter outside of my own stubborn mind. Typically it manifests as something between a thought experiment, a research project, a field test, and a forced period of reflection; if it’s not a part of a dumb project, I am less likely to actually look inward, or even outward. Take, for instance, when I needed to know if you could have a pizza delivered to a McDonald’s — to inside of a McDonald’s, while you’re eating McDonald’s, if you’re just there in the McDonald’s and you make someone come meet you at the table you’re eating McDonald’s at and deliver your pizza. The answer is you can, and in finding this out you’ll learn more about yourself than you might think. My lack of personal growth can largely be attributed to the fact that I’ve yet to have an obsessive pang related to why I fear vulnerability, can’t focus, am generally bitter, etc..
Recently I got stuck on “I wonder how many shoes I’ve owned in my life.” My initial guess was 40, based on nothing at all. (What do you think is your number???) To get to the total I’d have to itemize and track down each specific shoe, and it turns out I’m even more curious about which specific shoes I’ve owned than simply how many.
Despite the blunt absoluteness of the title, it’s hard to imagine I’ll ever be able to claim that degree of certainty. But lo, it is my stated goal to recall as many of the specific shoes that I have owned in my life as I can. I will ramble up top and over contextualize, which is nothing I can help, but amidst the dreck there should be, if I do what I’m setting out to do, a list of all of the shoes I’ve owned throughout my life.
I say it’s hard to imagine being certain of every shoe, but if I approach with that attitude then I won’t come as close as I know I can to a comprehensive list. I’m working off my memory here, and the internet, and whatever childhood pictures of me there are, which I’ve flown across the world to visit my parents in order to look through. I have one excuse for not nailing the list 100% (that doing so is insane) but I have no excuses for not exhausting my resources.
Hey, this is kind of like those videos where celebrities go sneaker shopping, with just a few major differences. Think if it like those videos except it’s me browsing through only the shoes I’ve had before and nothing else, and for the most part they are not shoes of note, and there’s a lot of speculation, and there are no producers or people to heighten the quality, and it is entirely my prose (fuck, sorry!) and again it’s just me and nobody wants this. Or, it’s not really like those videos at all, actually, but it is fun to think of how much some celebs like sneakers.
I’ll offer pictures when possible, stories when I feel like it, and, as ever, encourage your feedback: have we had any of the same shoes? What sort of shoes have you had? Are you a curious person?
I may point out but will not include in the hard count: athletic shoes, which I’ve had a bunch of, or sandals or flip flops. I will probably talk a lot about flip flops, I just don’t think I’ll be able to pinpoint all the ones I’ve had.
And for the sake of organization I’ll divide my life into sections, that we may more clearly see the trends of evolution of my shoes (this will also give me even more opportunity to regale you with specific spices that make up the gumbo of my life. So we’ll do birth-to-5ish, then elementary school, then middle and high school, then 18+ aka the wonder years).
Funny to think I was destined to conduct this investigation. I was destined to have all of the shoes I’ve had, and I was destined to one day remember them and write about them. This is what I believe. This is my destiny.
Birth — 5-ish
Baby shoes. I know baby shoes are a thing because of that classic drama, but how soon is too soon to wear shoes? Do doctors put shoes on babies immediately after they’re born? Do the baby’s feet need to dry first? Does the sock come first? If the hospital (in this case Methodist Hospital in HouTXS) provides some sort of shoe then that would have been my first shoe. And it would make sense because they provide blankets and hats (I think), and it would be very like a hospital to offer a bland shoe, such as the way they do with the velcro boots you sometimes wear after a walking boot or leg cast, or if you break your toe and can’t wear a normal shoe. White sole, blue velcro, you know. Would insurance cover this/would it be complimentary? And if you were birthed in a tub or the woods or some place like that, do you get no such hospital boot?
If the hospital doesn’t give a shoe then I really have no clue when shoes are introduced in the life cycle. Baby feet must get cold, right? Based on all of the images I have, through imagination or television, of taking a newborn home I really feel like their feet are covered, but is the onus on the parents to bring their own socks? Is it even healthy for a baby to have its feet covered like that? They might need oxygen.
Clearly baby feet are a mystery to me. I don’t know how big mine were, I don’t know if they were soft, or what it felt like to have them on my legs. I think I’ve figured out my first pair, but I cannot — and will not — accept my journey into wearing shoes as the standard for all babies.
Another thing I don’t know: during the life cycle, which age period sees the most rapid physical foot growth? Puberty? Little baby up until puberty? A school should have taught me this, and probably did, but I’m specifically interested in foot growth over time, year-by-year, which I’m certain a school didn’t teach me. My schools loved promoting inference and investigation when all I’ve ever really wanted was the answers themselves. I don’t know how fast feet grow on babies and it seems wild to have a baby try on shoes and then figure out if they fit or not, or to put a baby’s foot in a Brannock device, which you may now pause and look up (he said, patronizingly). I don’t want to have to do an experiment to know this, I just want someone to tell me.
I’ve found the following pictures that provide some insight into how I became a person who wears shoes.
As you can see, I was born bare-footed, and if ever a human was to feel shame over the appearance of their own feet it would be at birth. Look at those nasty things. Truly, upon first glance, I thought I was wearing a sock in this picture. Turns out I wasn’t and my foot just looks effed up because it’s still being formed.
I was hopeful that I’d find a footwear pic from the hospital, or from my first few days of oxygen, but I found no such pics. I did find a curious trend, though: in every early picture I feature in, my feet are covered, but not by anything constrictive like sock or slipper, but instead by blanket. It’s important to acknowledge now that not only do I not know what babies wear on their feet, but I don’t know what they wear on any part of their body, so consequently I can’t reverse engineer any reasoning for wearing/not wearing something based on what is normal. But I have to guess that the two-headed combo of babies getting cold easily (probably, right?) and their bodies being soft and unformed lends itself to wraps like blankets and sleeping bags rather than socks and shoes.
BUT, it is not impossible that at some point I WAS wearing a shoe or a sock and was ALSO wrapped up in a blanket. I will have to live with this lingering possibility preventing me from certainty. And no, I did not ask my parents, who would know, because I don’t want them asking questions.
Above, in the bottom right picture, at last, we see my naked feet, which look pretty good, I think. Maybe even ready for shoes. Definitely ready for socks, which as we can see in the coming pictures, have been introduced to my wardrobe.
One interesting thing about this picture is that it shows my cousin (far right), who is eight months my senior, wearing shoes…not just shoes, actually, but obviously baby shoes. These are clearly baby shoes. You know ’em when you see ’em, I guess.
Here’s an interesting shot of me, socked, lying on my mother, shoed, on the couch, which is not the type of family we were. Get your shoes off my couch, I’ll tell my adopted kids. But, as you can see, the people who raised me did wear shoes.
In fact, shoes were such a part of the culture that here I am with a literal shoe pillow. Clearly I’m being bred to love shoes, or at least to one day wear them.
But alas, here I am at an actual baseball game — at a baseball stadium where the ground is littered with popcorn and spilled beer and needles and sweat — with no foot covering. I truly don’t get the logic here. Even if only for sanitation, I’d have bet that a baby would wear something on its feet to the ballpark.
This could also suggest that there’s a regular putting-on-and-taking-off cycle for baby socks. In the Houston heat my feet would be warm, but in the Astrodome — the world’s first domed, air-conditioned indoor stadium — maybe they broke out the socks for me.
Then back home, when I need the protection less, it’s back to onesies and socks. And here on the far right, on my first birthday, nothing but socks. It’s now been a whole year and I have yet to wear a shoe! This blows me away. I assure you I looked through many more baby pictures leading up to my first birthday and not a shoe in sight. Are you even a baby after you’re one year old? Did I completely miss the baby shoe train? What a cute train that would be.
Choo choo! All aboard! The baby shoe train is at the station and will be departing for the future shortly. In February of 1994, at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo — the largest livestock show and rodeo in the world — I am spotted wearing shoes. Not cowboy boots, but they’ll do. And honestly thank god. If you think a baseball stadium is dirty, consider that pigs and horses don’t shit openly at a baseball stadium. But I digress. The point is, as far as I can tell, this is my first pair of shoes.
And wouldn’t you know it, it’s Keds. I’d have guessed that would have been the brand. Considering how constantly brands are changing their designs, I’m not sure if this is the model, but I believe this to be the Ked’s Little Kid Graham Sneaker in navy. The current models have a lower stripe on the side of the sole than mine, but the rest of the shoe looks comparable. I looked up Ked’s baby shoes from 1994 but couldn’t find anything closer than this, so we’re going to go with it.
Right now you can get this shoe for about $30, which in 1994 would have been $11.99. Thank god they’re so cheap. One of my big curiosities (you’re right, I did claim to not be a curious person, which I stand by) was how much money I’ve spent on shoes, how much money’s worth of shoe I’ve worn in my life, and — related to not knowing how quickly feet of children grow — how far a dollar will go for a kids shoe. This pair could have lasted three weeks and it could have fit me until age seven, in which case that would be the farthest stretching $11.99 imaginable, and tiny tiny feet for an otherwise normal-sized kid. Ked’s. Had to be.
No sooner than my first pair of shoes came did my second, which had quite a bit more flair than my Ked’s. Jordans. That’s right, Jordans. AirJordans. I, the adult, don’t really like Jordans (except for the 1s, the originals, because those are sick and I’m very much a one-and-out guy), but for a baby honestly these are pretty cool. Since I don’t love Jordans I don’t know much about Jordans and have no dog in the ‘these are the best’ or ‘this or that’ fight. All I know is that I showed up to the playground with Air Jordan IX Powder Blues, Crib edition. I can’t find the crib version online, but it looks like the adult ones go for hundreds of dollars. A far cry from the Ked’s pricepoint.
Based on the amount of pictures I’m seen in wearing these shoes and my disposition in those pictures, it looks like I really loved my Jordans. Here I am, above, with my Jordans and my first furry friend, Pepper. My mother labeled this picture to mark the significance of the date, which is a little morbid, but also curious as I progressed through the photo album and found my next pair of shoes, which I got within the next few weeks.
It was the 90s and doing things like this loved ones’ remains was twee and fine.
And here I am wearing sandals, because someone made me. I don’t know the brand and I also don’t like them. I am including them in this list as a bonus.
It appears that either the Ked’s (Ked’s? Keds?) had plenty of room for growth and were long-lasting, or looked so good on me/were so cheap that my folks bought another pair. Unrelated: the fuck am I wearing? Anyway, the Ked’s were a staple and, it could be argued, were the single biggest influence on me as a kid.
Next confirmed pair of shoes is a boot. And it does seem that I got them before a trip to colder climates. They look to be a versatile boot: capable of warmth and protection, still looking good for all occasions, casual to baby-formal. They’re light brown with darker brown laces, red eyelets, and black soles. You can see this. I have no idea what this shoe is. Could be any brand and I wouldn’t know where to start looking for them. There does not exist an archive capable of producing the specific results I’m looking for; try as I may to search “baby boots brown 1994 1995” I am routinely disappointed (not routinely, I searched this once and was disappointed once. The routine disappointment is with searches of the like, i.e. “what was that Chinese place I liked from a while ago” or “gamblers anonymous LA free buffet”).
And then, some absolute freaks, in a good way. These look like they’re converse high top shape, and the design looks like it’s either flames, or maybe a dinosaur situation. They could have even been self-painted, I really don’t know. Again, searching “baby shoe converse? red yellow” doesn’t yield an answer. Also, you can be sure that it is I in the picture and not some imposter with impossibly light eyebrows. No no, it’s I, and I’m holding my very own contract to prove it. Upon closer look, they absolutely look hand painted.
As we advance it looks like my feet have grown — these shoes look kind of huge. They’re also on the athletic side, sort of basketball-y, definitely my father’s influence. It’s a classic, understated Nike look, and I dig them. The gentleman hoisting me was my rabbi, a one P. Schaktman, who was my friend, and with whom I shared an inside joke stemming from The Lion King, but actually stemming from In the Heat of the Night, which I’d seen a few times by then. Guess the inside joke and I’ll shout you out in my next newsletter. Anyway, he lived in Hawaii for a while but doesn’t anymore.
Ugh, aqua socks — another thing I didn’t like. So far shoe alternatives are not faring well; sandals suck, aqua socks suck, and those dead dog shoes only reminded me of my dead dog, and not just because of the smell.
If you can identify this brand please let me know. All I can tell is that they are white and they are cool. Some sort of black insignia on the outside with a plain instep. They’re like old man shoes that cool young people wear.
My first rental shoes! Palace Lanes in Houston, now a redesigned entertainment venue, lent me their famous red, gray, and blue bowlers. Of course, the kids’ bowling shoes were velcro and the adult shoes had thin, stained laces. This was also probably my first dance with velcro. As I did not own these shoes they are here purely as a bonus.
Ok, let’s talk about this shit. Take a look around. You like this, don’t you? In so many of these pictures I’m tempted to talk about more than just the shoes, so humor me, please, while I point out how bad-to-the-bone I look. I would wear that outfit six days a week now, if I could. On the seventh day I’d wear a shirt that says “My good outfit is being laundered” and I’d wear denim shorts. But these boots are so, so cool, and more so than any of the aforelisted shoes are ones that I’d proudly wear as an adult. I don’t know the brand — they look like Doc Martens but definitely aren’t. They’re not Tims. They’re not these, from the Gap, but I feel like that’s the closest approximation of where they’d have been from, realistically — I wouldn’t be shocked if the rest of the outfit came from the Gap, as well.
I also thought it could be these, which look a little more similar, until I realized that these have a zipper, which it looks like mine do not have, and which I wouldn’t experiment with until I was 20.
As we find ourselves in Chicago we also find ourselves with some classic high top Converse All-Stars. This would be the beginning of a…relationship with Converse. I remember wanting these exact shoes a few years later in my life than this (this picture is from 1996; my craving was probably around 2000 or so) but I don’t remember knowing that I’d already had a pair. Regardless, it’s a classic. They look good on kids, they look good on adults, and they look good on me. Note that my parents have now encouraged me to wear shoes to the ballpark, which I’ve done ballpark every trip since. Mind you it’s not a parent holding me in the last ballpark picture, it’s family friend J. Feldman. Feldman, of course, comes from the Germanic name Fubmann, meaning “Foot Man” so maybe the old freak just couldn’t help himself.
More sandals. Nikes this time. Truthfully, I think I remember these sandals. The soles were comfortable but the top/velcro part had some itch to it, negating any comfort from the rest of it. Again, I don’t love velcro. I look at these and feel sorry for young me. I then remind myself of the socioeconomic status I was born into and the loving family around me and I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable privilege. Anyway, it’s not these but it’s close
Ok, what are these shoes and why are they so white? It seems like 1996 saw a sharp boost in acquired shoes. Maybe my feet were growing? Maybe I was doing a lot of walking? I can’t stress it enough that I don’t know. I also don’t know what these shoes are. They are all white like shoe #6 but the picture of shoe #6 was taken before this, and the shoes in those pictures are dirty and worn, whereas these look mint. They also remind me of another pair I’d get years later, but are not those.
Question answered! It looks like they’re white Converse Chuck Taylors, this time low top. Maybe not, maybe they’re something else, but that’s what they look like to me so I’m re-writing the history books and saying I had these shoes.
I now had three pairs of Converse shoes in my rotation, at least. Black high tops and black low tops.
* I spent time creating and numbering this whole list, only to look back now and realize I’ve added the black Converse high tops from this point in my life twice…changing everything now would be such a pain in the ass, but in my head there’s enough reasonable hope that I had low tops for me to assert that I did. Not a word about it, please.
I don’t know what these shoes are but apparently I hated them. Initially I thought it was the pair of Nikes as seen in the Rabbi picture, but not so. They look well worn, like I’d had them for a second. I have evidence of wearing them on Halloween, too, which was before the crying picture. An autumn sneaker? I guess. My “1996 childrens sneaker white” search brought nothing and I am left with another mystery, and this time I can’t just declare it’s Converse and move on. It is, though, a distinct pair of shoes that I can confirm having owned, which is part of this investigation.
I am pictured here in a power stance with some indiscriminate dark shoes with white soles. I am even less able to guess this model than I am the ones before it, even though these feel like shoes I’ve absolutely seen people wear, and that I have twice the clues as I usually do because my brother appears to be wearing the same shoes. I should beware, though, as his shoes could well be a red herring, albethey a similar-looking and plausible one.
Brown boots. That’s it. It looks to me like I’ve reached the age where having a dress-ish shoe is a must, and I guess these were just the flavor of the year. Given the turnover we’ve seen over the past year, I have to assume these were inexpensive, had some room to grow, and were functionally holdovers until the next pair of dress shoes was required, which is not a good way to look at things. Note that my sister is wearing those insane clear sandal shoe things. Noted? Good.
Big news on the plain dark shoe front! Looking past the fact that my face looks insane in the picture on the right and I never looked like that, at all, the dimensions of my face do not look right (or is it just that my sunglasses are higher than they should be so just makes my face look disproportionate and I guess it’s normal and I did look like that. Maybe. Not convinced), we can see a famous Nike swoosh on both instep and tongue. Confirmed Nikes, confirmed comfy-looking shoes.
Hey, I have yet to use the word “kicks” in this whole piece. Look at me!
So this one is interesting to me. This is what I believe is called a hiking boot, and I vaguely remember having these, but I don’t know why I had them. I also remember another kid in my preschool class having similar ones before me. Did I ask my parents to get me hiking boots? I guess they’re durable and warm and I guess just good all around shoes? I never hiked, I don’t know why I needed them, but here I am, flying a helicopter-plane.
Elementary School
Again, Nike. By this point in the investigation I am very frustrated with the searchability of these Nike sneakers. 1997, Nike, black body, white sole, purple accent on toe, black laces, little boy…it should be so easy.
Ok, we have a few things here. First of all, Nike. Nike has dominated my feet over these first few years of life. Second, these look beefy. Hydraulic. They have that velcro strap that goes over the laces, which all of the sudden I remember having. Yes, I remember these shoes now. But what are they exactly? I don’t know, Nike won’t allow me to know. It says something on the outside of the right shoe in this picture with dog, but it is too small to see. It must be the model of the shoe.
My first Pumas. Athletic shoes, so not part of the official list, but don’t they look good. Look at me run. Look how fast.
I had to wear these. The old man made me.
See the Nike logo? I couldn’t get enough. Before these we’d seen sort of boxier Nikes, whereas these look like a classic running shoe.
Athletic again. We now wear Lotto and we are even faster than before.
These? I couldn’t possibly know. I guess it’s shoe #17 again? Actually, no, it’s something else. Unclear, but the shirt I’m wearing is from a soccer camp I attended where I found in the grass a Peanuts-themed bandaid (used) and thought it was so cool that I hid it in my underwear until I went home and proudly showed my parents. Not a good story, but a memory.
Dress shoes again, but this time we have a loafer! Or so it seems. To me it looks like a brown loafer with long, untieable laces. I believe a friend of mine told me the whole situation with pennies and the penny loafer. I got a kick out of this and walked around + $0.02 whenever I had these on. I’m glad the makers of the penny loafer still make the youth sizes able to hold the pennies; otherwise you’re just doing it for adults, who have more important things to put in their shoes.
One of the rare undocumented youth shoes — I believe it was around this year of my lord that I did my first summertime tennis camp. And to fit in and/or play better, I got a pair of tennis shoes. Funny! Of all of the tennis shoes I’ve owned and have talked about, these are the only patently tennis tennis shoes. And they were the classic tennis shoes — one of the highest selling tennis shoes of all time — the Stan Smith. And we are talking plain, original Stan Smiths — all white, no frills, clean and classy. Good shoes! I’d take tennis camps summerly for years to come, but I do believe once the SSs no longer fit I’d just use my non-tennis tennis shoes.
These, I don’t think, are the same white running Nikes from above. Those had an orange accent whereas these seem to be a bit darker. But I don’t know. The ones I didn’t identify above I’m going to put as a swing pair: they are either these or the ones I’m wearing as a witch. These guys look pretty standard, pretty comfy, good support, basic colors, all good, three points.
Athletic shoes! These, I remember — though it wouldn’t seem it considering I had Jordans at the age of 1 — were my only shoes purchased solely for the purpose of playing basketball. I remember getting them at the Famous Footwear by my house before joining a basketball league for the first time. I remember the first time I put them on and dribbled around in my driveway. They were too stiff and I did not like them. But they do look a natural fit and obviously they are Nike. This band above my elbow..had somebody died? Ooh, another random memory about that basketball league. I was hardly strong enough to get the ball up to the basket. I think we used baskets that were shorter because of this. I also wore the wrong jersey to a game once and cried.
These are…I don’t know, Nike? I want to know the model, I want to know the size. Trust me, I want to know. But look how they shine! And surely they’re the ones I’m wearing outside two pictures above, which we called #21, but uh oh, the shoes below are also #21. Whoops. I lied about the third pair of Converse above, so it evens out. They look proper second grade.
Ok. My past three pairs have all looked so similar and I don’t know if these are the same as any of them. Not the darker bluer proper second grade ones, but….I don’t know, they all look the same to me now and my eyes are tricking themselves. One thing I do know is that these are not rock climbing shoes, but I, ever the rebel, persisted.
It has already become apparent — and maybe even a problem — that so many of my shoes from this period look the same, so much so that I now expect the upcoming pairs to look the same, making it harder for me to confidently say that they are different, even if they look the same. These look like they are not shoes I’ve already catalogued, but if you told me they were not different and you had any authority I’d believe you. Since I don’t see a swoosh anywhere I’m going to say that they’re not Nike, and they’re something else — something new. (Clearly they’re Adidas)
There is a shoe I had during this window that I’m confident I had but I cannot find pictures of and I don’t know what it was! It was a blue Nike, kind of wide, very thick sole, with very thin rubber nubs coming off the sole. It had some orange markings on it. I don’t remember much else, this is so unfortunate! I do remember that I got these shoes at an outlet mall and I do remember noting that I didn’t like how wide the soles were.
Ok, now we find me as a scout, and we enter into a phase that feels more emblematic of my shoes of youth. These (Nikes) I can identify! This is a Nike Presto Cage, I think, and I remember them being very light and very comfortable. I can also remember their smell, and I can remember running through the schoolyard in them. I might have even had another like pair in later years.
Athletic! Nike baseball shoes and an ill-fitting athletic cup. And a scowl. Oh could I scowl!
These are more Nikes that I remember having but I don’t know much else about. They were similar in texture to the Presto Cages, but with more of a flat sole. If I’m not mistaken there were some rubber parts that ran atop, like on the Presto Cage, but the same color and with no removal to the body of the shoe. These are the sorts of shoes that you can easily bend. You can squeeze them in two and you won’t damage the sole. How about that.
It is late January of 2022 and photographs have been discovered, providing new looks into my 25th shoe. In these never-before-seen images we can now make out the white and orange sole, the orange swoosh in the tongue’s position, and, if we zoom in on the middle image, the placement of the soft rubber ridges (in addition to better-lit insight into the exact color of these shoes). We also notice the green face paint and broomstick, but we ask no questions and continue on.
Eyyyyyyyyy! Well here we have something I mentioned earlier. Around this time (2001?) I got hungry for a pair of Converse All-Stars. It was the Summer — this I remember — and I called several shoe stores to see if they had them. We ended up going to a store that specialized in Converse! Eyyyyyyyy. It was not a Converse store but they had mostly Converse. I don’t understand how it wasn’t just a regular shoe store with everything, but it was definitely mostly converse. Anyway, they worked great as part of my Fonzie costume. (Eyyyyyy!)
These were shoes of mine in fourth grade and I find them unappealing now. They are boxy and shiny. Looking back, I can remember the texture of the shiny part; I remember rubbing it during class. Weird. So far they sit atop the list of shoes I’d least like to have now.
Ok, we’ve hit a big moment in shoe for me: Nike Shox! I thought these shoes were so sick, and they were definitely the tallest shoe I’d had to date. I had a friend named Linda whom I sat next to in one elective or another whose dad worked for Nike — or at least that is what I remember. She had really similar Shox and I think influenced my desire for these. We would talk shoes, sometimes rub them together, sometimes just rub. Near the end of fifth grade I was invited to her birthday party — a pool party at her apartment complex. Her two older sisters (half-sisters maybe, or cousins), both in high school, played twister together. This was a formative experience in my life. Songs About Jane was popular at the time and we listened to a few tracks while in the water. The day before this party I’d hurt my finger playing catch with a tennis ball. Simpler times.
Here we are, my sister and I, in Boston, MA, during wintertime, wearing what look like snow boots, or just winter boots — they’re those duck boot things. I am not sure what exactly it means to be a duck boot, but it does look like that’s what those are. This trip, is it happens, was an important marker on my lifetime shoe map. First thing to note is that those duck boots hurt like fuck — I actually think it was the combination of toenails that needed to be cut, improper socks, and stiff boots that did it, but at some point I had to make a stop in some hotel lobby to remove my shoes, clip certain problematic nails, rearrange my socks, and wipe the tears from my eyes, in that order. This, I suppose, is an issue with weather-specific shoes, such as boots for snow or for duck, in general, but definitely when you’re a kid and double-definitely when the specific weather is so infrequent that you probably just get a use or two or three out of them before you’ve outgrown them. Stiffness, blisters, and pain.
But this did get resolved and my feet were ok. A more important moment came a night or so before, at some Boston shoe store. I mentioned thousands of words ago that my dad likes shoes (or so I assume because my dad does really like shoes, but if I were to scroll up I would risk potential distraction, which is not what we need right now)— this manifests in us sometimes going to shoe stores when we’re out and about as a family. Did this happen with other families? Is that a thing normal families do? I don’t know, but on this night I saw, for the first time, a pair of Adidas Sambas. I fell in love. I instantly knew I needed them. They were $60 and Outkast was playing in the store. (The song was Ms. Jackson and it sounded to fun — I’d never heard this song and to me it sounded like they were saying “sovereigness Jackson” and so I replayed it my mind as such for years. At the time we were in Boston and seeing a lot of history about revolutionaries and kings and queens and it made sense.) I knew I didn’t need them need them, but I really wanted them. We just browsed, went back to the hotel, slept in Boston, whatever. Anyway, I ended up getting them. I don’t remember what I had to do to get them, or how hard I had to push (not very, I’d bet, as my dad loves buying shoes for his kids, notably), but I got them and they felt like home.
As some of you know, there are multiple types of Sambas. The Samba is Adidas’s longest-selling shoe, and is one of its most popular, but it, like massage, is not a monolith. My first pair was in fact not the classic. My first pair was the Millennium Leather Indoor Soccer version. Boy, I did really like those shoes. I guess we’ll see later if I ever had more (I obviously did).
The Samba, combined with my evolving taste at the time and my growing interest in soccer and all of its accessories and gear, spurred a loyalty shift from Nike (I know) to Adidas. Nothing against Nike! But very much something pro Adidas.
This is a very generic shoe and looks like Sketchers? The shape is the same as the shape of most of my shoes over the past few years. I don’t know what it is.
Here I am, jinked on smack, sporting some shiny dress shoes. From this point on up until a few months ago, I believe I had only black dress shoes, all more or less of the same mold: nothing fancy, black and sleek, thin lil laces, black sole, slight heel. That day, by the way, the Super Bowl was being played in Houston. After this parade of Jewish heroes I was taking part in (I was Louis Brandeis, Supreme Court justice, as indicated by gavel and Jew) my mother and I went to McDonald’s and got a 50 piece nugget.
Middle School
Around this point in time my mother grew tired of taking so many pictures, so I have less evidence of specific shoes than the first 10-ish years of my life. Fortunately, this reverse-aligns with the strength of my memory as I grow older. Still, though, my memory fails me often, and I am certain I’m going to miss some shoes moving forward.
During the summer of 2004, on a family trip to San Francisco planned to coincide with the West’s Largest Gay Pride Parade™, we made another family trip-within-a-trip to a Puma store. (We can pinpoint the purchase of these shoes to June 26th or 27th, I’m fairly certain). It was a cool, modern Puma store and we went twice (that seems to be the move on these trips — one visit to scout, a second to strike). And I (someone else) purchased my first pair of suede shoes. Blue suede shoes, in fact. Puma Speedcats. Kind of sick shoes. We had to scotchguard them when we got back to Texas to prevent water damage — what a hassle! I wore them proudly as I entered middle school. My first and best middle school friend called them clown shoes and bowling shoes, but he was a fucker! They were in fact racing shoes, designed for car racing, I think. The more I look at them online now, the more I think I’ll end up with another pair at some point in my life.
At the start of seventh grade I had a pair of very plain-looking New Balance running shoes. I was on the cross country team and needed a reliable pair, so I got something close to these. A boy at my school, also on the team but not as fast, and worse looking than me, had the same pair as I, but he laced his obnoxiously tight, which I know is what runners are supposed to do, but then I was never really a runner, I was more of a thinker, and sort of a kicker. I never liked being associated with him.
Also around this time — although I cannot be as specific as I’m not sure if I got them in ’05 or ’06, but sometime around this, but I have to think it was 2006 because in 2004 I got the suede Speedcats and it’s very unlikely I’d have had two pairs with such similar designs at the same time — I got another pair of Pumas. These were funkier and cooler and…mark an attitude shift. During these years — the 2005s, the 2006s, the 2007s — I was going through puberty. Changes were happening. I was girl thirsty (I was in love with one girl for three years, I mean, and in 2006 I got to hold her hand and see two movies with her! And it was also not love, but I was obsessed) and cared more about what people thought of me than I ever had. And while wearing these shoes at a friend’s house, early in my ownership of the shoes, he asked me if I didn’t think they were a little fruity. This friend, I’ll say, is a capital-g Good person, and is liberal and pro-good stuff, but was also insecure about things, and I didn’t think these shoes were fruity, I thought they were cool, but I did now have reason to think others might think they were fruity, whatever that means, or then meant. So in these shoes I had maybe my coolest shoes to date (barring maybe those sick white Shox), but I criminally under-wore them out of fear of judgment. I hate that sort of behavior and that and that alone is the reason I hate who I used to be and will never forgive myself. I’d absolutely rock these shoes now, I think they’re sick and I remember them being very light, which I do value in a shoe.
Oh, and the shoes themselves were not the ones pictured above! Almost forgot to mention that. They were Puma H Street model, and they were close to this, but instead of yellow there was red. There was no yellow on mine, but I’m not sure if it was a straight swap of red-for-yellow…I feel like there was something else. I’ve been searching but have not been able to find mine. Hopefully one day I will.
These beautiful men lifting me up in the chair were all guests at my Bar Mitzvah, even though I don’t recognize one of them. I became a man in these classic black dressies. They are not the same as the ones I wore as Justice Brandeis. They are similar but they are not the same.
An offshoot of the insecurity I felt regarding my Puma H Streets and in general was a slight shift in shoe aesthetic. Whereas with my Sambas and Converse All Stars and Puma Speedcats I’d gone with sleek and simple, I now wanted something that would say, “hey, I’m sweating from my pits now, I’m begging for facial hair, and I am usually erect.” So I got these guys. Clearly I had this sort of taste (big, elevated, basketball-ish, unused space in the heel, etc.) in me before (see: Shox) and I was not at all pretending to like these shoes — I did like them; I just leaned into them rather than towards the fruity pumas. I used to be able to put pens in the holes in the heel. I would do that during class. Unless it was English class because I loved English class and paid attention in English class. I did not play with my shoes during English class.
And not long after, a return to the Shox! This time bigger. Actually much bigger. Look at this thing, it’s huge. It’s so high off the ground. This is the Nike Shox TL, I think, or something close to it. It feels like I got these around 2007 — that’s where I’d put my money if I had to. That serves as “proof” that yes, feet do indeed grow during puberty, because getting those Impax one year and then the Shox the next…well sure, it’s just two pair of shoes, but as with the pumas, I don’t think I’d have overlapped such similar styles, and those Impax in particular were built to last, so I don’t think I would have worn them out before I grew out of them.
HIGH SCHOOL
I believe that around this time — again, I’d kill for a picture and a date — I got my second pair of Sambas. By now I knew that I had options, and I went for the most classic of the classics. Not only do/did I love the look, but I was on an indoor soccer team, so I used them both to look cool and to score goals, and to provide assists, which I did more of than score. (There is a picture of me wearing these shoes somewhere on Facebook. I am not on Facebook and it’s possible the picture has been removed, but there was a picture of me with my friend Lucas sitting on a bench by the high school track, talking. I was holding court and wearing those odd, quilted shorts. It was 2008. Please find this picture.)
And in a weird move — and I do believe I felt it to be a weird move at the time, which is another story — I picked up my third pair of blue pumas. These shoes had been in the…well it wasn’t a sale or clearance section, but some part of the store where they made it clear, ‘these are the last ones, and would someone please buy them’ at one of my favorite stores, soccer4all. They had this same shoe, only instead of blue it was grass-patterned, in a spinning display on the wall, but the blue ones were my color (blue) and more-or-less fit me, if a little oddly. These would serve as a pair I’d wear sporadically. Definitely not an everyday pair, but they had a good life and were an ever-present option if I needed them. Years later (2012? 2009? 20013?) I’d replace the blue laces with orange laces, which looked sick and was a good decision.
I’d forgotten this but I do still have these shoes, and have removed the laces altogether, wearing them exclusively as slip-ons.
As my two feet grow, so does my appetite for new experiences, and so at this moment in time I join the workforce. I accept a job at a local newspaper. I am 15 and eager to learn, but I have the wardrobe of a 15 year old and the only non-dress shoes I have are the shoes you’ve seen above, and I shouldn’t wear either to work (maybe I should wear dress shoes? Absolutely not going to though). I know that those Sperry boat shoes — you know, the ones that fuckers wear — occupy that liminal space between nice and shitty, but I’m not a fucker per se, so I get something close to the Sperry’s, but I make sure it’s lamer i.e. Sketchers and oddly shaped. I remember these shoes had an odd protrusion on the outside of each foot — like for a bunion or something. They also had little metal studs on the bottom, keeping the sole in place I guess, so depending on how I walked they would sometimes click. I didn’t know if I was supposed to wear socks with them or not and whether I did or didn’t my feet would sweat. They were shoes I’ve never seen anywhere else and am unable to find online. I’ve drawn them, but I am incapable of capturing their spirit.
I’m feeling now just how much more demanding this current task is than talking about pictures of baby shoes. At the points in time I’m describing I was a complex, ever-changing person and I am working solely off of memory of emotions and shoes and friends and laces. I am asking myself to describe sensations that I haven’t felt in years, with no touchstone. And so I must briefly ask for your understanding, that I may not be painting as accurate of a picture as I’ve set out to. I am doing my best, but some of these emotions taste sour, and I am submitting this un-fact-checkable piece to you as truth, when some of these truths can never be known. Please accept my apology.
Anyway, I got these Adidas Megabounces too, which were super comfy. I might have gotten them the previous year. I’m not sure, I don’t feel well.
I must have, in dream or some dazed wake, thought to myself, “let’s give New Balance another try,” because these are the sorts of thoughts I have in dreams and dazes. And I did, in fact, get another pair of New Balances — these guys, to be exact. These particular shoes had more of a roller coaster of use than most shoes I’ve had, which I will now try to remember.
I got them because I was doing a lot of running but I didn’t want like a running running shoe, I think. But then I started having knee problems and I suspected it was because of these shoes — I’m sure I had my reasons. I bought insoles for them and those might have helped? I think ultimately not as much as I needed them to help, though, so I couched the shoes for a while as I rehabbed my poor knees. At some point I realized I could just loosen up the laces and wear them…I don’t know the word for the particular style, but I think I can describe it: laces are loosened all the way down, and untied, with so much slack that the heel of the foot all but creeps out as you step, and the little shoelace nubs stick out of the upper-most eyelets. I wore them like that for a while, judiciously, and that was fine. They lasted me a while longer.
Lo! My third Sambas, this time in white. They are cool and I love them. Looking at them now excites me. These are who I am, for better or worse. These babies came with white laces, which were good Adidas laces, but it didn’t take long before I’d replaced them with black laces, and then sometime, a year or something later, I had some good yellow laces laying around, and I threw wove those in and became the owner of what looked like a brand new, sick, unique pair of Sambas. This was not my only dive into lace-swapping.
In 2011, just before graduating from high school (it might have been a day before, or maybe a day after…it was definitely the same week, that much I know), I was part of a Mark family caravan to the Houston Galleria, the seventh largest shopping mall in the continental United States. I don’t love a mall, but I do love the Adidas store, and on this day would not leave empty-handed. I walked away with something that, looking back, feels incredibly me within a very specific window of time, which I guess accounts for the fact that I did select and wear these particular shoes at that exact time. I’d been wearing flip flops to the mall (FUCK! I have not been documenting flip flops as I’d thought I might. But it’s ok, just know that around junior year in high school I started wearing them to school sometimes because they’re easy, comfy, and I’d sometimes derive a great deal of anxiety from the idea that I might have to put on socks…don’t know if that had anything to do with the humid heat in Houston, or if it represents something far less rational, but it was a truth. I’d also had pairs of them consistently up until then, but that was when I first had a pair I was comfortable wearing regularly. Hell, I wore flip flops to take the SATs, which doesn’t mean much but is fun to say.) and didn’t have socks to put on before trying these shoes on (this reminds me…shoe sizes. I have no idea what my shoe size is. Not true, I do have some idea what my shoe size is, but it bothers me so much that I can wear two different shoes that fit just fine, which vary by as many as two full sizes), so I used those disgusting, thin, panty-hose sock-like things, the texture of which is like nails on a chalkboard for me. Never again. I hate that sensation so much. I hate the way it feels, FUCK, I can feel it now, it’s such a bad ahhh, the toes and the toe nails, and the terrible gahh, it’s so bad, anyway I remember that from trying these shoes on.
Another thing about these shoes is that they squeaked. On any tile or wood or surface of the like they would squeak, and that’s annoying. Oh! Now I remember — they came with yellow laces but I swapped laces with them and the Sambas, so I had black with the yellows and yellow laces on the Sambas. There was also an orange pair of these same shoes that day, but I went for yellow instead. I wore these shoes to college orientation. On the first day I was in some elevator or another and somebody commented that my shoes were very bright, and I quipped something about making a first impression. I’d have done a lot of things differently then. I’d have maybe done all things differently, actually.
So, right before going to college….ok fuck it, I got a pair of Sperry Topsiders. Look I’d have done a lot of things differently then — I’d maybe even have done all things differently! I had reasons. To be fair it’s a very versatile shoe: you can wear them on a boat, you can wear them to a frat party, you can wear them to a business meeting, you can wear them to class, you can wear them at the regatta, you can wear them to court. I got them to fit in? I don’t know…I think I got them because I thought I needed something to fill that space and I was either scared to get something else or just didn’t know what else to get. At this point in time I was dating a well-to-do prepster who would go off to a northeastern university to pledge a sorority and in so doing make friends for life. This girl’s mother, a graduate of my university, tried to get me to take a job at her former sorority house, as a busboy I think? To which I responded, “Mrs. [redacted], I’m dating your daughter,” to which she responded, “why should that keep you from having a job as a busboy?” to which I replied, “fair point, I don’t know why in my head having that job means fucking lots of sorority girls when it absolutely does not mean that.” She should have piled it on then and said, “yeah, busboy is a shitty job and nobody wants to fuck you…even my daughter, who actually likes you won’t fuck you, she’ll only kiss you a lot,” but she took the high road and kept eating her fish salad. Point is, these were the voices in my head at the time, trying to white-wash me, trying to dress me up like a boatsman. And to some degree it worked. Have to say, I don’t find these shoes very comfortable. They gave me lots of blisters and I felt like a knob wearing them.
THE WONDER YEARS
If my records and memories are correct, I did not buy a single pair of shoes as a collegian; I bought my Sperry’s a few weeks before and then made no shoe purchases before leaving on an indefinite break. And this probably for the best — my taste was rapidly shifting, I had little money, and I had no interest in amassing more stuff. Plus I already had all I needed: boat shoes, squeaky bright yellow sneakers, white Sambas, New Balance running shoes (unlaced), blue Puma indoor soccer shoes, dress shoes probably…what more could I need.
I will tell you. What I needed then, that I now consider a must: a pair of sick boots. No, not cowboy boots (I had put on cowboy boots once before in my life, in 2003, in Iowa, and they were not my shoes. They were so tight that I cried) — regular boots. Brown boots. I’d been in New York for…a couple months and I was quickly wearing through my sneakers. I also didn’t have shoes that offered more protection than a sneaker, from the elements and work-wear, and I also didn’t have shoes that didn’t look like stupid sneakers (I’d probably made some vow to not wear the boat shoes again, ALTHOUGH come to think of it I might well have still had the weirdly-shaped Sketchers boat shoes), and as I was regularly going places where I needed to look good, I needed shoes that also looked good. And so I got my first boots.
These were beautiful brown boots (material unknown. Leather? unknown) with a zipper on the instep. They had laces too, but you couldn’t get them on or off without doing the zipper — the two-factor verification of the shoe world. Someone in my life at the time was MAYBE A CIGARETTE SMOKER and I always wanted to step on their butts and twist them into the dirt, but I never did. These boots were trusty and reliable and I liked the way they looked and felt, but they were also my only non-sneakers so the winter effed them up — cracks, salt-damage, etc.. It didn’t take long (don’t think they lasted more than 1.5 winters) before I couldn’t wear them into the cold for risk of stepping in freezing slush and then having a foot covered in freezing slush for the rest of the day. Bad for my health.
In 2014 I needed something comfy and cool, which I found with ease in the form of the Onitsuka Tiger Serrano. I wish I had a pair to try on now to check what I’m about to say, but I don’t, so I say blindly that these were maybe the most comfortable shoes I’ve ever worn. When I first put them on I remember knowing they were winners, and the first few weeks/months with them were brilliant. Perhaps part of what makes them so comfortable is how light they are, and indeed they are thin of sole — as a result, they lasted less than my average pair of sneakers does. Lost tread quickly, got holes in the upper quickly, got holes in the soles quickly, and soon enough no longer provided the comfort they did on first wears. But for that short time, boy they were great. I also love the look of them. I’ve been wanting to get more Tigers, maybe Serranos, maybe others.
In I think 2015 — I think — I got my next pair of walkers/runners/sneakers. Another pair of Adidas, also from the DSW on 79th and Broadway, which I’m fairly sure now accounts for my last four shoe purchases. My dad bought me these shoes — I think — and it was yet another comfortable pair. The sole on these was far greater than that on the Tigers, and although the sole was not dense, it was thick, and it would last at least as long as I’d expect/need it to. I don’t have any pictures of these shoes but I can picture them so well, and the disconnect between my mind’s eye and my mind’s words won’t allow me to describe them that well. I can write 10,000 words on the shoes of my life, yes, but I cannot paint a picture. I am not a painter; I am someone who uses lots of words, ineffectually…the opposite of a painter. They looked kind of like this and kind of like this and…………
The next few years’ worth of shoes will be harder for me to get exactly in order. In 2015 I started walking dogs semi-professionally (it was the whole of my income but to call myself a professional dog-walker would a) do a disservice to people who behave as professionals, and b) make me sick to my stomach) and wore through shoes faster than I ever had. The Adidas mentioned above I believe to have gotten just months into this gig, which I would do approximately four years longer than I should have. During these four years I averaged, I don’t know, 24,000 steps a day? Years ago I’d have been able to tell you the statistics, but now I could not say. A lot. I walked a lot. And I don’t really even like walking that much. And the pay wasn’t great.
These things I believe to have procured not long after I started walking, but really it could have been 2014, 2015, or 2016. I’ve spoken a bit about durability of a shoe, and by now you know that I was walking a lot in all sorts of conditions. I needed — and I do mean needed — a pair that I could dedicate to dirty work: shoes for rain, or sleet, or even just cold. And in this pair of Sketchers I found what I needed. I didn’t necessarily like the way they looked, but they were reasonably priced and could absolutely fulfill what I needed them for. I wore them so doggedly and through such harshness that the laces they came with eventually died. It sounds odd, but one of them ripped in a few spots and one of them kind of disintegrated. I replaced the laces because these waterproof sketchers are truly workhorses. They’re also, to be honest, pretty comfy, and I’m now noticing that the tongue advertises that they have memory foam. This makes sense — it does feel like they have memory foam.
I had a pair of Pumas that looked sort of like the Onitsuka Serranos in build, but I guess actually just looked like Pumas in build. They were simple: blue, white Puma swish, a little red…you know, exactly the type of Pumas I’m wont to wear. Not unlike the Serranos, these guys didn’t have the longest shelf-life, but were pretty flexible and I wore them into the ground, as I will do with all shoes unless I am ashamed of them (Puma H Streets) or they’re uncomfortable/indestructable (Puma v1.06fg).
Dustin’s fourth pair of Sambas was….any guesses? Black? White? Funky? Hint: look at the picture. They were black. They were the plain black classics a la my second pair. I loved them. I’d like another pair. Nothing more need be said.
This pair of Adidas was close to the blue ones above, but one quality tier below. Maybe not quality tier, but durability tier? They functioned similarly and had alike builds, but both the exterior and the sole on these were just a touch less lasting. But then, I was pushing my shoes to the limits in these days, so maybe I’m being unfair to the shoes. Note the lack of vibrancy. Note the drabness. Was I sad? Was I just trying to blend in? That will be broken down in my next too-long piece: HOW SAD I’VE BEEN AT EVERY POINT IN MY LIFE. Without spoiling anything from that piece, I probably just liked the way they looked and felt
Either around this time or a little after this time I got another pair of indoor soccer shoes — flats, if you like. Whereas my previous Puma flats had been destructable, these guys were built like Sambas, so not work boots, but not cheap and flimsy. This was a comfortable pair of shoes that also went well with just about EVERYTHING. I haven’t talked about that part as much, but it has played a role in many of my decisions. The low-top flat — the Samba, the this shoe, the whatever — do well with pants, the way I wear pants. A big basketball shoe or something with more thickness might mess with the way the pants fall, but not these guys. These particular shoes have a corduroy vibe to them already, which is also my vibe. The future of this pair would not be glamorous, though, as they’d become stinky and dirty before too long. I once (maybe more, but that I remember) wore them through a full day of walking in heavy rain, after which they were never the same. Once they’d been soiled this way, they became my workout shoes. Yes, I used to sometimes work out. I was a Planet Fitness member in 2018 and a small part of 2019, and I always favored a flat because I liked the stationary bikes and I liked being able to securely place my foot flush against the ground with no extraneous bits. I was still walking dogs (four years, remember) and would work out right after a day of walking, so if I wasn’t already wearing these shoes I’d stop by my apartment and put them on, my socks already nasty from the day (if you take off dirty socks and put on clean socks without cleaning your feet you are wrong), and make them nastier. Planet Fitness is a nasty place, and it could be argued that these Pumas were too good for it.
This is a valuable selfie because it shows not only my very plain dress shoes in the foreground — the last pair in a long line of personality-less black dress shoes I’d have before my current pair, which we’ll get to soon — but the tan Pumas in the background. They were reliable, they traveled well, they were great. The more I reflect the more I realize how prime these shoes were. And back to the dress shoes, they are Florsheim, which seems to be a fine brand for budget fine shoes.
I hardly remember having these shoes at all. They don’t look like something I’d have purchased, but I must have. Upon further reflection, I can picture them from different angles and I believe they were very thick and protective and meant as a shoe I could abuse — something I didn’t care much about the look of and could use for dirty work. My one picture of them, without which I wouldn’t have remembered them at all, is from the gym, so they must have replaced the tan Pumas at some point.
Now, to something a little more comfortable and a little more fly. I got a pair of Adidas…Pure Boosts, I think. They had a black/white/gray speckled design, were very light and comfy, and had a good life.
We’re now getting into interesting territory: shoes that I still have and wear. Here’s YET ANOTHER pair of Puma flats, only this time in white. This pair came with either black or white laces, I’m not sure — either way I was able to improve them with my very own red laces. Weird story: a few days after getting these shoes I ran into my roommate on the train (I saw him everyday, we lived together, but got on at different stops going completely different places, I tell you this city is crazy and the world is a little on the small side) and he immediately noticed that I had new shoes, which I confirmed. And then he asked if I’d changed out the laces, which by now you know I had. How did he know that? There was no sign of poor lacing or anything, and the red laces go so naturally with the shoes that I think it looks like it could have been sold this way. He’s not a sneakerhead or anything, and if he were to have been a sneakerhead I don’t think these very plain Pumas would be his expertise, but that is conjecture.
Durable and reliable as those Sketchers may be, I worked through a few blizzards and had never really had a snow boot of my own, with the possible exception of those duck boots I was spotted wearing in Boston. I was also, in ’16 or ’17, or maybe even ’18, having a very hard time with one of my feet. So effectively was it eventually treated that I can’t even remember which foot, but I had what was in essence a growth near the ball of my foot. It was uncomfortable to step directly on it, causing pain on its own accord. It also caused me to adjust the way I walked and distributed my weight, which hurt other parts of the foot, and my knees, and hip, and made me very grumpy. It didn’t help that I was wearing improper shoes through the snow or whatever. Honestly I’m getting my timelines mixed up, but the point is I needed nice snow boots so I spent the most money I’ve spent on a pair of shoes to date on a beautiful pair of Pajars. I don’t know how to pronounce Pajar…the ‘j’ may or may not be silent, I really don’t know. It’s a Canadian brand, which is made clear. They’re super high quality and I kind of dig having shoes with the Canadian flag on them.
These are my flip flops! The brand is REEF. They’re comfy and have been good to me.
I mentioned above that I think a nice pair of boots is a must-have (nice meaning sick, not nice meaning fancy), and I mentioned that my first boots went to shit quickly, so I got another pair of boots, this time no zipper. The laces on these boots are long and soft. I love the way the laces fall. I love the way these guys feel, I love the way they look…I just love the boots. I got them from the same DSW I’ve been getting most of my shoes from, and looking back and realizing that I wasn’t a part of whatever their rewards program is I am upset by how many rewards I essentially threw away. I do love these boots, I really do. I like them so much that when they wear out I kind of want to get another pair of them, or have them re-soled. That said, I’d kind of like some big black boots.
And important to mention that around this time I got a very real interest in getting some insane shiny silver boots, specifically these. I shit you not when I say I kind of came close.
While we’re getting close but not getting the cigar, I almost pulled the trigger on these, too, around that time. These were at a different DSW, this one farther north (125th St). I did and do think these are really fly, and feel like they’d make a lot of sense on me, but I was dissuaded for reasons I cannot remember. Aren’t they cool, I’m now saying to myself.
The next two pairs come from the same place, a soccer store in Manhattan’s famous Upper West Side. I intended, sometime in 2018, to start playing soccer again. It’s one of my true loves and I miss it. I signed up for alerts for this pickup futsal group who would host games a few times a week, and my Sambas must have been shreds because I felt compelled to get a pair of indoor shoes. I went to the store and saw the options (oh how I love a soccer store) and ultimately had to make my decision based on price; I went with the cheapest of the ones I liked, which were these Tiempo Premier Sala IIs in all blue. I went home and threaded through some white laces, but that looked either too much like a bowling shoe or too much like a gift box…I don’t remember which criticism I had but I think it was one of those two. I took the white laces off and put on some orange ones, which looked fine — better than the white but I don’t know. These shoes are a super tight fit, which I guess I didn’t realize when I tried them on? I was probably so distracted by the rest of the store that I didn’t feel the discomfort. This particular store has patches of turf and balls to kick around and I think I was just happy to lightly kick a ball or juggle it a few times that I was like, “fuck it, I’ll get these.” They fit, but they’re not the most comfortable, and they make my feet look small, which is not an insecurity of mine as much as it is just weird to look down and see feet that look unfamiliarly small. Still got ’em. The laces on these guys are the same laces that once graced the blue indoor Pumas, I believe. Looking at these shoes also reminds me that I think I wore them through a severe weather system or two, which kind of messed up the texture on some parts.
I presume when another pair, perhaps the speckled Adidas, gave way, I needed another general running/walking shoe, so I returned to the soccer shop. I’d scoped out some options online and knew what I wanted: the Nike FC React in black and white with a little red accent. The website said they had them in stock and when I showed up they didn’t have them in stock! I’d gone so far out of my way, all the way to Manhattan’s famous Upper West Side, and I didn’t want to return, so I got a different color scheme instead. Very happy with the fit and the feel and that, and I like the way these look, but I did really want that other color scheme.
NOTE: I have not played soccer in either of these two pairs of soccer specific shoes. Not once.
My current dress shoes — the most recent additions to my bag I keep all of my shoes in — are these beautiful brown (cherry brown? Nickel? I assume there’s a name for the specific color) Florsheim guys. I was a part of a wedding party and I was threatened that if my shoes did not match the groom’s then I would be yelled at, which I hate, so I got these. Aren’t they nice! They got a few compliments on the one day I’ve worn them, but then with formalwear I guess people are looking for something to compliment, and my shirt, which did not fit properly, disqualified itself.
The final pair of shoes I’m reluctant to explain. I’ve written and spoken at length about these shoes for the un-published reboot of THE DUSTIN MARK SHOW, and not only do I not like repeating myself but stories like these, with such inane stakes and details, must be told exhaustively, and I don’t really have the energy for that. Frankly I’m tired of talking about shoes by now. How about this: if/when this piece of media about these shoes gets published I will return to this piece and link it [HERE] — if there is no link then the piece in question remains unpublished. And so as to not leave you completely unsated, a summary that misses some key points and most of the spirit:
I designed several custom versions of Converse All-Stars. 6, actually. The video is online — you may search. People voted online and I was then given (because I purchased) the winning pair. The details of my interactions with Converse, the politics involved in the voting process, the accidental buffoonery on my part that almost compromised the integrity of the endeavor (which, looking back, didn’t have much to compromise), the fright I fear wearing the shoes in public, not wanting anyone to comment on the shoes because then I’ll get worked up and feel compelled to share the journey…all of these things are for another time (check back for link). This piece is but a catalog of my shoes, and these are my shoes, in more ways than anything else listed above.
Wow. I guess that’s it. What did I say, 40? Together we counted 63! And I probably missed between 4–9, or even less or even possibly more. But what a journey. I’m absolutely not going to go back and edit this whole thing. It is currently October 8th, 2021. Any shoes purchased after this date will not be added to the list. Not to this list, at least.
I was going to do a recap but this whole process was exhausting. Let’s see what I can scrap together. There was a lot of blue. Lots of Nike, lots of Adidas. 4 pairs of Sambas, 4 pairs of Converse All Stars.
I’m likely to continue wearing shoes, and can assure you am now thinking about shoes differently, mostly in that I have trapped myself in a prison of shoe memories, and all shoes henceforth will be viewed within the context of this history. Oh well, that’s what I get for being curious.
You know the drill, keep your hate speech to yourself, we’re all fragile and trying to love ourselves.
