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SHOPPING FOR "EWWW" SHOES

By Ed Clancy

Wednesday, April 02 2008

When I bought my new cell phone back in September, I discovered I could play music on it. In fact it was already loaded with four songs, one of which was by somebody named Paolo Nutini entitled "New Shoes." Catchy little ditty. It came to my mind in February as I went shopping for new shoes at the mall. The first thing you need to know is that I am not a shoe person. Whether I am broke or flush, I rarely have more than two pairs of shoes in my closet: one black and one brown. And one pair of athletic shoes for walking. Oh yes, I usually wear a really neat pair of plasticized/rubberized slip-on sandals. You know, the kind with the little bumps on the inside that massage your feet. I love those sandals. My girls got them for me a couple of Christmases ago, paying two dollars for them at Target. I would like to wear them all the time, even to work.       So, it was with dismay that I surveyed the condition of the shoes in my house. The brown shoes were very soft and comfortable, more like Dockers but not as expensive. Cheap is a better word. Because I kick them off at night, the bottom of one shoe had become unglued from the upper some time ago. My black shoes looked like the kind I wore in the Air Force and kept shined for inspection. The heel in the left shoe had also come unglued. As for my sneakers, (Shaq’s, thank you), they would have been in great shape were it not for the fact that I had recently found myself up to my knees in a mud filled drainage ditch while carrying a bag of Taco Bell tacos and a full sixteen ounce cup of Diet Coke while trying to report on a Mardi Gras parade in Covington. The good news is that I didn’t drop the tacos or the Coke. The bad news is that the mud and gook rendered my sneakers unsmellable in spite of two trips through the washer and dryer. Having taken the plunge to look for new shoes, I found myself in a place called The Rack Room, at the Esplanade Mall in Kenner.       The reason I am not a shoe person is that I hate to shop for shoes. I even wore my Supersandals to make shoe-trying easier. I was rather proud of myself, therefore, when I found a pair of reasonably priced brown Dockers. (I fixed my total budget for all the shoes I needed at between $150 and $200.) On the Nunn-Bush shelf I saw a pair of black dress shoes called the Marcel, size 10 ½. I tried them on, and they were not as soft as my brown shoes, but felt solid and looked stylish without being effeminate. They were a little tight, so I pulled out a pair of size 11's. As I opened the box, I was surprised to notice that not only did the shoes have a different design on the toe, they were much lighter than the size 10 ½ . That made no sense to me. I tried them on and they fit like a glove. A warm, soft glove. I asked a young sales girl what she made of the disparity in these two pairs of identical shoes.       She immediately said, "It’s because the pair you have in your hand are Thom McCann’s." I was incredulous. "I’m incredulous!" I said. (See? I told you I was incredulous.) I was also confused. She explained that someone had apparently purchased some new shoes, and placed their old ones in the Nunn-Bush box. Or, more likely, they had stolen the new shoes and left the old ones behind. I was still confused, because the Thom McCann’s looked almost new; hardly any tread ware, the tops were undamaged, although they could use a shine, and they almost had that new shoe smell inside. In addition to being incredulous and confused, I was disappointed. I really liked those shoes. The sales girl smiled and said, "Why don’t you take them?" Sensing a deal, I asked her how much she would charge me for apparently used shoes. "Nothing. You can have them. We certainly can’t sell them, they don’t belong to us."       I was, (you guessed it), incredulous. I was also elated. Next, I found a pair of Converse sneakers, which, I am assured by my daughters, are more cool than Shaq’s, which are found only at Payless. I was even more elated when I was told that all the shoes in the Rack Room were BOGO that night. That means "buy one, get one half off." So, I walked out of the store in my Supersandals with three pairs of shoes for the sensible price of $86, including tax! This story has a post script: Usually the stories I tell about myself on my radio show are about my ineptness, clumsiness and stupidness. This time I had a story about my success against the Machine. I came out ahead in the daily war which we call life. After I finished telling my story, we went to commercial. The studio door swung open and in walked my good friend, Mary, our office manager. She leaned down to me and said "Ewwwww!!"       I replied, "Huh?"       "Ewwww!!" she repeated. "You’re actually wearing some stranger’s shoes??"       I admitted I was. I was no longer elated. I was crushed. My victory had a major flaw, and Mary was clever to discover it. I have, however, decided that I don’t care. They’re practically new, they don’t stink, and the soles and heels are in great shape. I will wear them with pride. Yes! I am proud to wear my "Ewww Shoes." Cue Paolo Nutini! Bookmark

 

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