Shared with permission
because my mom says she loves self-directed humour. She learned this from her mother.
I have been on the move lately, so this afternoon I sat down to collect my thoughts. This Sunday is Mother's Day in my part of the world. I think about my mother, my boys, and realize I won’t be with either of them this year. I stare at the blank screen, so white, so spacious. I’m not sure where to start. I look down at my sneakers, also so white, so spacious. I start here.
They are thick, squishy running shoes, the kind that feel like marshmallows on my feet. They aren’t pretty, but yesterday they took me on a long walk through fields of bright yellow rapeseed and flowering broad beans then into a market for fat asparagus, long, slender leeks and purple shallots. Last night they supported me as I snapped the woody ends off those asparagus and trimmed the leeks and shallots. I tossed them in olive oil and sea salt and James seared them on the barbecue with the lamb we bought at the butcher yesterday afternoon. My sister-in-law chopped a handful of pistachios with preserved lemons, garlic, parsley and mint to serve with the barbecued lamb. We were cooking as we do when we’re away together - getting creative with what we have. The chopping board was so full of beauty. I took a picture then bounced on my comfortable sneakers all the way to the sink.
My sneakers are not as white as they were just a few days ago. It’s hard to pack lightly and move with ease from field to farm to kitchen without dusting up your footwear. I should have packed my Blundstones.
And just like that, I am thinking about Mother’s Day again, because I wrote a little story about my mother and her Blundstones not too long ago.
I’m going to see if I can find it.
Inside my parents’ front door are two closet doors: one for my dad and one for my mom. There’s a wooden chair to the left of the door. A black woven scarf with colourful tassels hangs over the back of the chair. A small woven rag rug sits on the floor to the right of the door. It’s a traditional rug in the area; my mom bought it in the village across the river. Right now there are two pairs of brown Chelsea Blundstones side by side on the rug: big and small, hers and his, respectively.
The New York Times recently declared Blundstones the shoe of the 2020s. They were originally designed in 1870 as a boot to withstand “the cobbled city streets, rugged farmland and dance and factory floors” of Tasmania, and not much has changed. With their unisex sizing, rubber soles and elastic sides that make sliding on and off easily, anyone can wear them, anywhere. Just this morning I spotted five pairs of Blundstones in the changing room at the gym. You can slip them on in the dark, hike in them, cook in them, walk the dog or wear them to a wedding. My dad likes Blundstones because they suit his country lifestyle. My mother likes them because they fit her feet.
“If the shoe fits, it’s ugly.” That was my mother’s line growing up on the east coast of Canada, when at the age of eighteen, her feet had reached a women's size 11.5. That was 1964, when she painted on black eyeliner, wore five coats of mascara, backcombed her short chestnut hair, smoothed it with a brush then set it with a heavy spray of Aqua Net for her college nursing classes. She couldn’t finish the look with the dowdy shoes available for larger feet at Winsby’s Shoe Store on the main street of Halifax. Instead she crammed her toes into cute heels, curling her toes like Cinderella’s ugly step sister trying on the glass slipper. Except my mother is beautiful; she couldn’t have it all.
Bunion. I can’t say it without squishing my face together, as if inhaling a moldy onion.
A bunion is a bony bump that develops on the inside of the big toe joint. Years of too small pointed-toe heels will exacerbate that bump and encourage hallux valgus, the condition where the big toe drifts towards the small toes. It can also happen when shoes are rounded, but just too small, like the pair of blue suede shoes with flaps that my mother wore all through grade eight, long after her feet had outgrown them. She had begged her mother to buy her those shoes. She loved them.
Sometime into motherhood, rheumatoid arthritis set into my mom’s joints, lifting and twisting her smaller, straight toes. Summer sandals were a relief, but they exposed her misshapen feet. She now wore a size 12.
Skating wasn’t a problem. White figure skates, the skates of my mom’s childhood, came in men’s sizes too. She would skate over the windswept ice of the Bedford Basin on winter weekends in those feminine skates, pushing off the toe pick as we swirled around her. Trips to Toronto took her to the shoe store Tall Girl, a shop that sold up to womens size 12. Eventually she ordered through their catalog, but happiness wasn’t guaranteed. Tall Girl shoes were often pointy and cramped; shoe length wasn’t a guarantee for comfort.
I have inherited my father’s high arches and straight toes. I am an average size10. But over the years a touch of hallux valgus has set in on my left foot. I’ve worn too-tight shoes, cramped boots with thick socks and heels that I’ve had to kick off on wedding dance floors. I don’t know if I’ve done this to myself or if my mother’s genetics were always baked into my feet. But I don’t talk about my tilted toe. My older sister spent a summer scooting around on a single-foot walker after an orthopedic surgeon shaved off her bunion. My mother had a similar surgery and painful recovery, but her toes were left worse off that they were before. My feet are considered delicate.
The New York Times added that Ugg’s were the shoe of the 2000s. My mom had an early pair here in Canada. Their softness soothed her feet, cradling them in lambswool and a generous girth. But at five foot seven inches tall, she isn’t tall enough, in her mind, to balance out the length and width of a size twelve Ugg. She felt like a Hobbit.
Blundstones were the answer. She slips into them, like so many women I know, and moves seamlessly through her day. They’re a compromise, a move from traditional femininity. Cool over beauty. Sometimes when a crowd comes over cousin Gord will wear her Blundstones home by mistake. Sometimes I wear my dad’s pair when I visit. They’re always there on the rug by the door.
Postscript
PS - Sunday May 11th is the last day to bid on art in support of Wonder’neath Art Society in Halifax. I have a few small watercolour studies of pears in the auction. You can bid here.
PPS - My mom was on my mind this time last year too ❤️
So the lesson is buy Australian shoes? 🤭 Tell Mum to check out a brand called Rollie. They make the coolest comfiest fashion sneakers and most come in men's and women's sizes. I actually just ordered a pair before reading this. Happy Mothers day my friend xx
Love my Blunnies! I’m glad your mom found what worked for her.