Tales From Exit 22 by Al Batt

I was resplendent.

Decked out in in my best duds — blue jeans, a Carhartt shirt and nice socks. Not my socks. I don’t own any socks. I rent them.

And Crocs.

Crocs are big creatures that aren’t quite alligators and Crocs are shoe-like things that cover feet. They aren’t likely the Crocs you’re thinking of. The cartoon bubble over your head is probably displaying footwear with no laces, a strap on the back and breathing holes. They appear to be made for boaters or beach bums.

Crocs are lightweight, plastic shoes that are ugly, comfortable, cool, the opposite of cool and, some claim, dangerous. You might not want to be a professional escalator rider and wear Crocs. The one thing I know for sure about Crocs is that they multiply at a rate that would make any rabbit envious.

Once upon a time, I was afflicted with plantar fasciitis, and a medical professional who had been to school told me that I should wear Crocs around the house. They might have helped. My owie went away. I cried Croc tears. The shoes made me look like the Duke of Dorkdom.

Crocs are like nearly everything. They aren’t for everybody.

My macho, gun-toting, brother-in-law, who eats meat while taking communion at church, wears pink Crocs while he runs the combine through cornfields. He wears them because they are comfortable and they bring out the color of his eyes.

I have Morton’s foot or royal toe. My second toe is longer than my big toe. I shop for shoes late in the day because feet tend to swell by then. I don’t clip my toenails because I want to give them room to grow.

Because of all of this and the actual size of my trotters, I take a size 14. That puts me in the clodhopper class. I’m also in Clem Kadiddlehopper’s class.

Once, when finding a pair of shoes that I liked, I tried on a size 13 pair. They didn’t fit. My wife said it was because I’d put them on the wrong feet. She has some goofy ideas. They’re the only feet I have.

Feet are the basement of the body — a basement with toes. I know a guy who wears size 22 shoes. He’d be a tall fellow if he weren’t bent over so far at the ankle.

I’ll never be able to retire by liquidating my shoe holdings, but I do own a pair of Crocs. The ones I was wearing back in the first paragraph looked like loafers. There were no breathing holes. They walk with me just fine. The main reason I like them is that I don’t have to go shopping for them again.

I’m terrible at most every kind of shopping, but I stink like feet with that limburger cheese smell at shopping for shoes. As a shopper, my limits are limitless.

“Honey, I’m going shopping for shoes. Why don’t you come along with me?” asked my wife, The Queen B.

I wanted to scream, “Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo!” I’d just bought a new book and I had a lot of coloring to do in it. But we hadn’t been married long and I was still struggling with what my duties entailed. There was no written job description for husbands in those days.

“Why do you want me to go along?” I whined.

My wife replied, “I want your opinion on shoes.”

“My opinion isn’t worth anything,” I protested.

“I know, dear, but I still want it. I know that if you like something, I shouldn’t get it.”

I went. There were no cellphones or iPads to check on sales or store locations in those dark times. Our tablets were Car-Ferry spiral notebooks and Big Chief writing tablets with pages made of newsprint paper.

We had to go to at least 19 stores. It seemed like 90. We didn’t take a single selfie. My lovely bride pulled shoe after shoe from a shelf and asked me what I thought of it.

I was wearing Red Wing shoes. I liked them. She didn’t show me any Red Wing shoes.

I hung in there. You’d have been proud of me. I wasn’t even wearing a safety helmet. Eventually, I snapped. When she showed me some fine footwear, I said, “Oh, those are precious. Please get them!”

I might have clapped my hands repeatedly in mock excitement once too often.

If the phone doesn’t ring, I know it’s my wife not calling me to go shoe shopping with her again.

 

Hartland resident Al Batt’s columns appear every Wednesday and Sunday.