We are a society of the here and now. Many decisions we make as individuals and as a nation are short-sighted and focus on immediate gain. The result is that our lives get messed up over the long term, and then we get frustrated wondering how that could’ve happened. I recently experienced this phenomena firsthand.
You see, a year and a half ago I was lucky enough to accompany someone on a business trip to South Beach in Miami. South Beach has always had this sexy allure for me with its snazzy hotels, steamy pools and dimly lit oceanfront bars. As a professed lover of dark corners and a shameless exhibitionist, I have long loved the ability South Beach gives me to either “be seen” or fade into the shadows. On this particular trip, I decided that I needed a sexy pair of those ginormous-heeled shoes in an espadrille… because what is more sexy than a super-high espadrille? Nothing, of course.
So, I found THE pair of amazing espadrilles and purchased them. That night, as the lights went down on this energetic city, I put together my ensemble: short sexy dress and said espadrilles. The result: hot, hot, hot! My companion and I descended the elevator and stepped out onto the street where the crushing weight of my (at that time) 160 pounds began to press down on the ball of my foot – the only thing holding me up at this point. After one block, I was starting to crack. How could one pair of awesome shoes be so uncomfortable? Clearly they needed to be broken in.
We went to one swanky hotel bar with large square seats around the pool. I immediately took off the shoes and prayed that when I put them back on, they would magically feel better, but it was not to be. I hobbled to the next bar, and then I just couldn’t walk any further. I very gingerly walked almost all of the way home barefoot. If you know anything about South Beach – a very dirty place, especially in the height of tourist season – you’ll know what a risk I took.
I brought the shoes home with me in my suitcase, never to be worn again. This, however, did not stop me from thinking about them. “Why?” you might ask. Because about 6 months later, a large bump appeared on two of my toes. I found this rather odd, and the only thing I could attribute it to was wearing those shoes. It has been a year, and JUST NOW they are starting to fade away. I even visited a podiatrist to check them out, and he said they would probably just go away on their own. What’s funny is that I had visited that same podiatrist about 20 years earlier when I would constantly wear 3″ pointy-toed heels and always had painful ingrown toenails. I stopped wearing pointy-toed shoes.
So, here I was again… 20 years later. One night of trying to be sexy equaled a year of weird bumps on my toes. The result: not so sexy. Lesson learned.
Wow, and you LOVED those shoes… great story though