Boldly Barefoot...

Sunday I planned to visit my mom after Church services. Sunday I also wore my brown slingback heels. Slingback heels have always been my favorite type of dress shoe for me.

These slingback heels have a strap that goes around the back of your ankle. There is a buckle on the side of your ankle to tighten the strap so the shoe stays on your foot. The strap has a piece of elastic that one piece of the buckle fits in. On my brown slingback heels the elastic had stretched out and come loose. I had not been able to find a shoe repair place to fix this simple repair for me.

After several attempts to find a repair place, I just paused a while and looked at my shoe. I thought I could fix it myself on my sewing machine. One evening I carefully used my ripper tool and cut the old elastic free and opened up the layers of the strap. I cut a piece of elastic and after several attempts had a fix on my heel. I was very happy.

So Sunday I wore these brown slingbacks to Church. Everything was great until I left Church after choir practice to go to my car. I planned to drive to the nursing home first to visit my mom. As I crossed the parking lot, I realized my shoe would not stay on my foot. I checked out the situation and found my elastic fix had come undone. This meant I was 'shoeless'. Hmmmm....

I revised my afternoon plans and headed to Papa's to visit with him and put together a music program for Wednesday. We had a chuckle out of my being barefoot.

When I got ready to leave Papa's, I told him I wasn't sure how the nursing home would feel about me coming in without my shoes. Seemed like there might be some kind of sanitary rules against that. But I really wanted to sit with my mom while I was in Georgetown.

I drove to the nursing home.

As I parked my car, I thought about how interesting I must look in my Sunday duds and hose with NO shoes. I decided that, once again, I would hold my head high and walk like I knew what I was doing...after all...I did, didn't I?

I passed people leaving the nursing home, gave them a big smile and a cheerful "hello" as I walked past. Then I went to the nurses station. It was change of shift time. The little nurses station was full. Slight groan within.

Then I said, "My shoes have broken. I'm bare-footed. Is it still okay for me to come in and visit my mom."  There was a few seconds of awkward silence as they all digested what I just said, then the need to look at my feet, then the chuckle. It was that kind of chuckle that let me know it was not a problem to go visit my mom.

I continued down the hallway to my mom's room. I fought off the urge to do like we did when I was a kid. Our home had all hardwood floors. It was great fun in our sock feet to get a little run going and then slide across the floor in our sock. My mom used to put paste wax on these floors and then give us girls old towels to pull each other over them to polish them. Great fun!! I fought off this urge and walked to the end of that long hall to visit mom.

I had a nice visit and as I left I had to explain to a few others why I had no shoes on my feet. I am a Southern girl that loves to be barefoot anyway.