Nails–Part Dos

Before we go any further we must delve into the past and explore your fearless heroine’s Lifelong Dilemma Pertaining to Footwear. Yes, I’ve blathered on about it before and I’m blathering on about it again.

I have to drive home the point, man (read: have searched for relevant posts so as to link but cannot find them. And I’m tired. And cranky).

As you ALL know I’m a woman of a warped Amazonian build (read: 5′11 with ginormous feet) and, as such, have had a ridiculously hard time buying shoes ALL my life. It started becoming a major problem when I was a mere 7 or 8 years of age. With size nine feet. That’s GROWN UP nines, people. NOT your very nice, tiny, and incredibly average Buster Brown sized nines. And I HATED it. While all my fellow female Pope Groupies (read: we of Ye Auld Catholic Faith) walked up the aisle for first communion wearing perfectly adorable white patent leather Mary Janes, I wore hideous bone colored Old Lady Shoes. Oh how they laughed at your poor beleaguered Bigfooted Babs.

*sniff*

So, along with doctors, I had a healthy love/hate relationship with small-minded cobblers, too. As did my parents. For in my youth it was THEY who had to foot the bill (really?? Did I REALLY just type that?? Gun?? Anyone?? Please??) for their firstborn’s tootsie togs. They had to lay out three weeks worth of paychecks and half a mortgage payment if I needed new dress shoes (read: first year of HS in 1986 + $110 a pair = Very Annoyed Parents), whereas they could get away with relatively cheap shoes (read: prices far less than the GNP of Portugal) for the boys.

I had three, maybe four places, where I could get shoes. All of which, save for one, were not on the island. Two stores in Manhattan, one in Jersey, and a for an all-too-brief time, a lovely store here on Jewett Avenue.

And, over the years, I developed a Very Weird (and some would say warped) Habit. Especially while in the mall (and it doesn’t have to be the mall here, it can be ANYWHERE). When I’m bored, and stuck waiting for someone I’m with to take three hours to shop for fucking CURTAINS (oh how I WISH that post weren’t in my Paranoia Drafts Folder) I go for little jaunts to the various shoe stores. And I inquire in each store as to whether or not they carry my size (or sometimes just say ‘What size do you go up to??’), even though I know full well they probably don’t* carry same. I then put on an affected air (if you will) and say, in a rather hoity-toity manner, ‘Well!! I guess I won’t be shopping here!!’ Which is a rather asinine statement in and of itself because, hello Babs!! Of course you won’t be shopping there!! They don’t have your fucking size!!

But it is amusing to me. And it’s fun to see the snotty little shoe elves jaw drop when they say ‘Oh. What size do you need??’ as if I were some sort of genetic freak (ok granted, but STILL).

*In fairness I do secretly hope they actually HAVE changed their size range and actually carry things in my size. Because it would be nice to shop in normal stores and not Shaquille O’Neal’s Drag Queen Shop. But I really, REALLY should just accept the fact that Nine West is never EVER going to carry 13s

I do the same thing when, on the rare occasion, I have to rent bowling shoes (yet another thing lost in the Great Storage Auction Debacle of 2004). I always ask for my size in womens shoes first. Then I act grumpy in a ‘You know not ALL women are a size 6!!’ manner and ask for my mens size 11 1/2. And, I must admit, that when I was Down South, I was quite shocked when I requested my usual 13s and the Pin-Monkey said ‘Coming right up!!’ And went to fetch me a pair of shoes. ‘My god!!’ I thought to myself, ‘The bowling establishment has finally acknowledged we of the Canoe Footed Tribe!! Soon I’ll be able to buy bowling shoes in purple and pink and powder blue!!’ Then I looked at the shoe and saw it was a mens shoe with a line and a number underneath it denoting its womens size equivalent. And was I ever mightily vexed. Yea verily.

So, yes!! We have established that your fearless heroine is not only a bigfoot, but a freak, as well.

When I left the interview-non-interview the other day I’d decided that, since I was already out there, I’d have a peek at one specific store.

A store that’s very dear to my heart. A store that, once it had opened, saw me more often than did my family. A store that sold not only clothes for We of Heft, but shoes for We of Big Feet. The ONLY store on the whole of the island that sells 13s. And semi-cheaply.

{Unless Payless has caught up with their brethren Down South and has now started stockpiling a Gunboat Section. Not that I am thrilled with their cheaply made shoes, but beggars can’t be choosers. Especially a size 13 footed beggar}

I bought shoes I needed there. And I bought shoes I didn’t need because they were on clearance for $10 and in MY size. I bought shoes that were ugly and shoes that were pretty (and, yet again, a trunk full of them were lost to the Great Storage Auction Debacle). I embraced my inner Imelda.

In light of the fact that I’d just interviewed-non-interviewed for a (what’s looking like a very, VERY, definite) job, it would be a smart move. For this job will require me to wear fancy-pants clothes [as most of the crap retail jobs out there require]. And smart shoes. None of that jeans-and-sneakers business that I could get away with at the supermarket. Even the Thanksgiving Ensemble that I wore on my first day at Buzzy Bee’s Busybody Emporium wouldn’t cut it, should I get said job (again, very likely, as have received calls from two different persons in said shop already). So stopping at this shop was imperative. Since I’ve NO fancy-pants clothes anymore (read: except for horrid Mama Cass-esque blouse and one long sleeved shirt that Sylvia gave me six years ago for my birthday). And I’ve only got ONE pair of nice looking flat shoes. Which, incidentally, I’m still trying to dry because it was fucking pouring the day I went out there.

To all my island readers, I ask but one question:

When were one of you bastards going to tell me The Avenue closed down?!?!?!

Now, not only am I vexed, potato-less, leather-belt and silver jewelry-less, and kitchen doo-hickey-less, I’m shoe-shop-less, too.

Fuckers.