Shoes

Shoes are everyone's earliest companions. They walked with you long before you had memories. In childhood, shoes always seemed to outgrow your feet. Mom would say, "Buy them a bit bigger, so they'll last longer," and you'd wear shoes that were slightly loose, your feet sliding around inside like a small boat without a mooring. Back then, shoes were white canvas sneakers with round toes. They'd get dirty with wear, and Mom would scrub them with a toothbrush. After washing, they'd be hung out on the balcony, a row of little shoes facing the sun as if they were sunbathing. Later, you got your first pair of shoes that were truly yours. Not chosen by adults, but by you. Maybe it was a pair of sneakers with cartoon characters, or perhaps shoes with two-colored studs on the laces. You wore them to school, walking extra carefully, afraid of getting them dirty, afraid of scratching them, afraid of others stepping on them. It was the first time you felt something was entirely your own. As time went on, shoes began to gain functionality. Running shoes for gym class, rain boots for rainy days, leather shoes for weddings. Each pair of shoes corresponded to a situation, an identity, a presentation. Standing in front of the shoe rack before going out, you weren't just choosing shoes; you were choosing who you would be that day. But some shoes, you can never throw away. The pair that walked with you through a certain period, with soles worn askew and uppers wrinkled, you just can't bear to part with. Because those shoes remember the paths you've walked – the alley you walked on your first date, the forty-minute walk on your interview day, the footsteps of your solitary walk home late one night. Shoes don't speak, but they remember. What shoes taught me