Stylish Shoes

I'm not a slave to fashion.   I'm not a fashion minion either.   I think I'm more of a fashion bystander mostly.   I look at the fashions and some I gladly have no interest in.   Other fashions I can do fairly easily, like running shoes.   The colors are crazy right now and you can't find normal-colored shoes, so I just by the shoes and don't worry about it.  But other fashions I want to be a part of, only I can't figure out how.

Take ankle boots, for example.   I see women wearing skirts, shorts and all sorts of shorter-length items wearing ankle boots.  The look great doing so.   The fashion looks "right" on them.   But when I go to the store, anything I try seems to be "wrong"—it doesn't work.  Not only does it not look right, it looks downright unfashionable.   I like the look, but with that fashion, I'm left at the sidelines, wearing my sneakers or my sandals, wondering how those other ladies make it work.

Today we were at an outdoor mall.   We had dropped the children off at an indoor play land extraordinaire (we had to carry them out to eat lunch, they were having such a good time.)  While Nana watched the children, my father-in-law, husband and I went off in search of a place for lunch in the mall.

Once we'd selected a place, I decided to go into a mainstream clothing store to walk around.   I had just said, "I don't like going into those boutique stores.  They just don't work well for my low-grade level of fashion."   I walked over, opened the door, walked in and realized I'd made a mistake and gone to the store next door, which happened to be one of those very clothing boutiques.

Their clothes were different though.  Their way of displaying them was to put them in sort of blobs and not perfectly neat, folded stacks.   This was largely because a lot of their inventory was thin or lacy or knitted materials delivered in little garments that covered only small bits of your body.  

It wasn't a lingerie store, these were the latest in summer fashions.   There were dressy clothes, jeans and a random set of shoes placed between stacks of clothes.   It was like a clothing treasure hunt and I had fun picking up and looking at many of their clothing items.

Then I found a shirt I liked.   There were some jeans in black (I've always wanted jeans in black) and, wait, what are these neat-o ankle-height shoe/boot things?   I found about six things I liked in ten minutes that covered the normal amount of body parts and headed to the dressing room.   The two ladies working there were friendly and we chatted and there was no pressure about anything and, hey, those black jeans fit and the shirt went with it and that pair of heeled shoes/boots (they're some sort of amalgam I'm not sure how to describe) were dynamite and I decided I needed them.   (That means I wanted them a whole lot, not that I really "needed" them.)

My husband called and I told him to come to the store and give me advice.    I told him, "see, look, I can wear these shoes with these jeans and then...hold on (dressing room action) they also go with this  running skirt I came in with.   Wow, don't you think I should buy this great stuff, honey?"

He said, "why of course dear, whatever makes you happy."    Okay, you know it didn't go down that way, but he did say they looked nice and I always appreciate his truthful opinion, so I bought the lot.

I am excited about those shoes—which are both comfortable and stylish—and I can't wait to get home and have opportunities to wear them.    I think I might just have figured out a way to get off the sidelines of fashion with these new boots.  

The Big Boy Tiny Girl Bathroom Update:  At lunch today we decided it was time to take the children to the bathroom.   When we told them it was time to go, my daughter said, "there are no bathrooms here."   My son had his own reason for not going to the bathroom, saying, "I'm holding it forever."