Shoes

Ski boots connect the skier to their skis, translating body movement to speed, turns and crashes. My ski boots are black with white buckles and usually covered in snow. Putting them on is like digging a grave and jumping into it, but taking them off is like seeing the sun for the first time. Walking in them requires relearning how to walk. The boots lock my ankles and I must hobble around the lodge like a zombie, ominously clicking heel-toe, heel-toe against the worn carpet. But once I clip them into my skis, I don’t need to relearn anything.

My dad is a lifelong competitive skier and takes me to Bristol Mountain for the first time when I am three years old. I don’t remember much about learning how to ski, other than being on a leash for the first few years and falling off the chairlift two or seven times.

My ski boots are rigid and supportive. The tighter they are, the harder I can “crank” my turns. Downhill skiers lean forward in their boots, pressing their shins against the padded tongue. If a skier exerts enough pressure, their boots will rip the hairs out of their legs. My shins don’t grow hairs anymore.

I ski my first Black Diamond only so I can tell my older brother I did it at a younger age than he did. I don’t fall once. Afterwards, in the lodge, my mom watches my dad skeptically from behind a newspaper, wondering why he let me do it. He laughs, triumphantly throwing his boots into our family ski bag.

It’s with my dad’s attitude that I’ve gotten myself and many others into some sticky situations. Creating new trails, trying new tricks in the terrain park, getting stuck in between two trees, and running out of snow. Sunset Lodge hot chocolate always tastes better after attempting something questionable.

Most of the ski boots I’ve owned were hand-me-downs from my older brother and became hand-me-downs to my younger brother. The buckles on the front of my most recent pair are old and require teeth-gritting and calluses to secure, but my dad thinks this builds character. When I start racing, all of my competitors have the same blue racing boots, which certainly look cooler, but don’t provide their wearers with a free pre-race workout. My dad asks me if I want a pair, but I prefer the hand-me-downs.

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Track spikes, or just spikes, are lightweight running shoes with metal points protruding from the sole. There are different kinds of spikes for different events. Since I typically run shorter distances, my blue and yellow spikes have all their points towards the front. They rip a hole in my drawstring bag on the way to our meet, so I know they’re sharp enough to race on.

The upperclassmen on my track team give their extra metal points to the younger racers and guide them through their races. Turns out there is a strategy for running specific distances; it’s not just “try to run faster than the other kids.” For the 400m dash, the key is to start with an all-out sprint, “float” slightly slower than top speed for the second hundred meters, stride as if running uphill for the third hundred meters, and “kick” as fast as possible for the finish. Before every race, this strategy stands with me at the starting line, but usually, it false-starts, sprinting away from my head before the gun goes off. It’s just me, my empty skull and my spikes for 400m around the track.

Ninth grade. The eleventh hour of a ten-hour track meet. Our coach realizes he forgot to enter a team for the 4x800m relay, the last event of the night. He looks at the four girls sitting closest to him in the tent. “Stella, Gemma, Maddy and Chloe! Perfect! Start warming up!”

As I am notoriously terrible at rock-paper-scissors, I will be running the anchor leg. The anchor leg is typically for the fastest runner, and it’s the most intense part of the race. However, since none of us run this distance, we are destined to be out of the competition. “It’ll be funny, guys!” I watch my teammates run their hardest, spikes flying around the track. By the time Maddy hands me the baton, we’re about 150 meters behind the closest team. I take off, ponytail flying, stadium lights glaring down upon my face. My makeshift relay team yells at me, most of their cheers sounding like catcalls. By the time I make it back to the start line, everyone else has finished. I am alone on the track.

The bad thing about the 800m is that it’s two laps. For the final lap of the race, I could do anything. I could walk, cartwheel, sumersault, or turn away from the track and disqualify my team. I look down at my spikes and dig them into the rubber, picking up my pace for the kick. My feet are weightless and my bones are hollow. I clock in at the finish line with a personal record (PR) 800m split. My team gets last in the race and we buy pizza bagels to celebrate.

My mom likes my colorful spikes because she can always pick me out on the track. Tonight, she didn’t need to work too hard.

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Slippers confuse me. Why make a shoe and tell people not to wear it outside? Why do people buy these? When I get a pair of white, fuzzy ones for Christmas, I understand the enthusiasm. I am walking on clouds.

Perhaps, as a teenage girl, the greatest benefit of slippers is the silence. I’m clumsy, as we know. If I come home past my curfew, my whole family will wake up to creaks in the floorboards. But if I leave my slippers by the back door and immediately put them on upon entering the house, they won’t hear a thing.

I am not a cozy person. Typically, I seek speed, adrenaline rushes, discomfort, exhaustion, fear. I crave the chase. I want medals, crashes and victories.

Fuzzy slippers slow the world down. They give me the chance to read the books on my never-ending list, to light a fire and to bake lemon tarts.

I can think inward. I can create.

My cat likes to sleep on soft surfaces, and my slippers are her favorite. When I write at my desk, she curls up on my feet. I can’t stop writing until she wakes up.

Over quarantine, I keep my slippers on, from my first steps on my bedroom carpet to the rolling credits at the end of whatever show my dad wants to watch each night. Tiger King, Freaks and Geeks and every nature documentary we have access to. When we watch lion documentaries, we root for the lions to kill and eat the zebras. When we watch zebra documentaries, we root for the zebras to get away. When we watch the news, in the early days, we root for two weeks off from school. In the later months, we root for a return to school. I take my slippers off for family walks at sunrise and sunset. I used to hate Sundays, but now every day feels like a Sunday and I can’t hate every day.

My slippers are not clean and crisp anymore. They are embroidered with cat hair and bejeweled with dirt from my mom’s plants. Thankfully, the outside world will never know.

White Air Force 1 sneakers go with every single outfit. I’ve pushed this idea, wearing them with a bikini, a black minidress and a superhero costume. I thrift a pair of these shoes the summer before college. I think they were probably made for tweenage boys, but hey—if they fit, they fit. I don’t ever untie them, I just slip them on and off whenever duty calls.

Upperclassmen tell me that for my first semester of college, I need a pair of designated “frat shoes.” Shoes for falling, getting stepped on and wading through puddles of rainwater and sweat and alcohol. Shoes for being okay after falling, getting stepped on and wading through puddles of rainwater and sweat and alcohol.

When my friend Mary and I go to New York City, it rains the entire weekend. The only thing I hate about rain is getting my socks wet. But there’s so much dirt (and other mysterious matter) caked into these shoes that they’ve actually become water resistant. The laces are permanently knotted by Sunday. It’s an awesome trip.

My first Spring Weekend at college and I’m jumping up and down along with hundreds of other people in a confined space to a song that’s been remixed so many times it’s unrecognizable. Right as the beat drops, another student comes down from his jump and lands directly on my ankle. My sneaker doesn’t move, but the joint does. I hear a lovely crack and start to fall, but my friends catch me. Ten hours later, the five of us are leaving Health Services with my brand new crutches. Five hours later, we’re on our way to the second concert. I can’t fit the sneakers over my swollen ankle, but my roommate lets me borrow her Vans. My X-ray results come in during the third song—severe sprain! No break!

Shoes for comparing with friends and debating whose are the dirtiest. Shoes for traveling. Shoes for walking under sunsets, fireworks and street lamps.

Going barefoot is an interesting sensation. It’s grounding and perplexing at the same time.

Walking barefoot on rocks requires gentleness, patience and careful distribution of weight. Walking barefoot on sand requires cleaning the grains out from between toes. Walking barefoot in the campus library requires fried brain cells and a complete lack of care about what other patrons will think.

At the age of four, I run barefoot through wet cement, selectively blind to the caution tape around the new sidewalk square. My family moves towns, but my tiny footprint is a permanent resident. At the age of eighteen, I take my sandals off and accidentally step in spilled white paint from a mural, tracking it all over a parking lot. I wonder if my prints are still there.

The same bare feet under pink ribbons, forceful buckles, silver spikes and dirty knots. The same footprints growing farther and farther apart over the years.