An Ode to My Boots

The Lonely Boot

It was September 2010 when we met and it was love at first sight. The location: the bus terminal in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. The occasion: travelling from Copán Ruinas, on my way to catch a plane to Amsterdam. Price: 100 Lempiras (= $5 = 4 Euros). So it wasn’t just love at first sight, it was love I could afford.

Never did I have a pair of boots that were so comfortable, so simple to put on and off, so easy to combine with either skirts, dresses or pants. Perfect heel height, not too prissy, not too classy, not too masculine either. A match made in heaven!

My boots accompanied me to Spain on two occasions and have been with me during basically every important event in my life in the last two years. They were there when I opened my art shows, there too at conferences, parties and fancy dinners. Also present at less formal gatherings with the girls or a casual stroll through town. I’ve often been unfaithful, changing my boots for sneakers or sandals, but for special occasions, I always came back for my boots.

About a month ago, my girls and I ended up dancing the night away and that was, alas, the cause of the end of my boots. After a few hours of dancing, including Gangnam style, the 2 inch heel of my left boot gave way… At the time I wasn’t aware of how bad the situation was, not even when I was forced to hop all the way home on one heel. But the next morning, the seriousness of the situation finally dawned on me… The heel had fallen off, and unfortunately it was not the sort of heel that could be fixed, since it was an integral part of the rubber sole. Nevertheless, I glued the heel back on, knowing it was a lost case…

A week later I was all dressed up for my Eighties Dance Party, except for shoes… I went to the second hand store to look for some work boots to go with my Cyndi Lauper/ Madonna-ish outfit, but I happened to find a pair of boots very much like the ones I had just lost so tragically. So I bought them. They were not as cheap as my previous loved ones, but at Lps. 165 a pair, not bad either…

My new boots passed the test and survived the dance party. So I decided they could come with me to a conference I was going to attend in Tegucigalpa, last Monday.

I got up very early that day to walk the dog, pack my bag and shine my boots. When I finally was ready to put them on, I noticed that one boot, the right one, made a clacking sound when I walked, while the left didn’t. I looked at my heels and saw the left one had a rubber piece covering the heel, but the other didn’t. Well, it was too late to do anything about it, or to change my wardrobe according to my shoes. So off I went, with one silent and one clicking boot.

On the way to San Pedro Sula, we stopped at a gas station. I stepped out of the car and as I did… my left heel fell off my boot!!! I started cussing, couldn’t believe this happened to my “new” pair of boots! But when I looked closely, I realised I was wearing on my left foot my old boot, while on my right foot my new boot! Not only had I been so stupid to put on two different boots, I had put on the one boot with the broken heel!!!

So when I made it to the terminal, the first thing I did was hopping to a shoe store to buy new boots. I found some, put them on, and then, with some ceremony, threw my beloved and heelless boot away in a trashcan at the bus terminal, at the exact same place where we had met the first time.

The other boot (the “new” one) I dragged to Tegucigalpa and back.

And now, back home, I still have that one “old” boot, in perfect shape and I don’t know what to do with it.

Poor, lonely boot.

I guess I’ll have it stick around a bit longer...