So Shoe Me

One Shoe
Originally uploaded by ver.

A few years ago at a little store in Laurel Heights, I bought a long, almost impossibly narrow black skirt with a bit of gathered train. To carry off this skirt with the requisite drama, I went on a serious search for black shoes with a vertigo-inducing heel. Without question, the best person to bring along in these instances is Kuya Mike, a man who has devoted an entire room in his flat to the care, preservation, and display of his shoes.

Off we went.

We quickly zeroed in on these shoes (and though you only see one in this picture, I will continue to refer to them in the plural, ya smarty pants); in fact, I didn't even try them on. But I did wince as I forked over the $300 required to claim them as my own. My brother, who frequently commits this sort of spending folly, was a calming presence. "You'll wear them forever," he said.

This was true. They pledge allegiance to no trend; despite the exaggerated point of the toe, they are decidedly classic. But...kinda sex-ay. Okay, overtly so. Which is why in the eight times I've worn them, I have never paired them with a short skirt. For that, my people, would be vulgar--especially when wearing these stockings.

I quickly learned that certain men react to these shoes in...how should I say?... a certain way. A way that--at first--simultaneously embarrassed and outraged me. But then I realized how freakishly little it had to do with me at all. Few of these staring fools even look past my ankles. They become so fixated on my shoes that I am simply obliterated from the equation. Which is fine by me. And so I am free to observe their fascinating (if fairly gross) behavior in the same way that, let's say, a woman on the other side of the restaurant would.

And what I think I observe is this: they are into the shoes because the person wearing them is, in fact, held captive. She can't run away (hell, she can barely walk) in these shoes: he's the lion, she's the newborn gazelle. But what they seem to overlook, these men, is that she could easily slip the shoe off and--using the tip of the heel as a weapon--take out an eye.

These are my favorite shoes. Of all time.