subscribe
Falling for Shoes
Just Ask a Woman is within walking distance of shoe heaven. We are wedged between well-heeled Soho and Union Square, the foot traffic mecca and home of DSW whose strategic platform conference I recently emceed. (Yes, you’ll be slogging through shoe puns this entire blog!)
We recently completed a project for Naturalizer, where three women divulged that they’d been victims of ‘fashion injuries’. “Ha Ha,” I laughed.
Till last Friday.
That’s when I slipped twice in the same shoes, cut my forehead, and earned myself an emergency dash to a beauty-centered derm, usually a cakewalk in Manhattan but no small feat on a weekend in July. Five stitches later, my accident became a Rohrschach referendum on me and my shoe IQ. Female friends taught me firsthand (feetfirst?) the marketing Half Truth (Women love to shop for shoes) and Whole Truth (Women secretly despise the shoes they wear most).
“Were you wearing super high heels?”(do they think I’m an impractical fashion victim?) “Get rid of those old flip-flops!” (am I pegged as a barefoot slob?) “Did you throw those shoes away!?” (and if I didn’t, I’m an idiot, right?)
Truth be told, the real me isn’t a fashionista or a slouch. The guilty pair were my favorite, super cute Beverly Feldman straw ballet flats with an iridescent green crumpable bow and a teeny leopard-like edging. How could I toss my babies for one small slip?
Instead I sneaked to the shoemaker (ironically named FIRM Shoe Repair), flashed my nasty stitches and sadly placed the weapons on the counter. Even he wanted to put them out of their misery. “Just one last chance,” I conspired. We say we want comfortable shoes. We do. But when they’re extra cute and loyal, we can’t send them six feet under before their time. (Anyway, if the new rubber soles won’t save them, my bonus DSW $10 certificate is burning a hole in my wallet.)
share the love:
