Girls love
shoes. That’s a given. But when you’re growing up on a farm; wading
in irrigation canals hunting for frogs, or running through the mud chasing cows,
shoes are more trouble than they’re worth.
Still it’s
important to make some kind of a fashion statement at school and on those trips
to town.
Usually mom
bought my shoes.
I’d get one pair at a
time and they lasted until they were too tight or trashed.
Occasionally I did
have a pair of dressy sandals to wear to church.
I distinctly
remember a shopping trip for shoes when I was probably about six.
Mother must have been busy so she sent me
with my dad.
A girl knows how
to work the system when it comes to daddies.
Somehow I talked him into buying me a pair of Krazy Keds.
I must have
heard the commercial on the radio a hundred times
about how U.S. Keds would
help you run faster and jump higher.
And believe me they did!
I had to look
all over the internet for an image of something like those wonderful Keds.
Each piece of the shoe was a different color;
the soles were soft and kept me from slipping on wet rocks along the ditch
where we played. And since they were canvas they were washable.
My dad worked
winters in Pocatello, Idaho while Mom tended to the farm. Sometimes we’d ride the Union Pacific train
to visit him where he stayed with his mother who just happened to be my grandma.
On one of those
trips I went shoe shopping in the big city.
To my delight I
came back with a pair of real Buster Brown saddle shoes.
Buster Brown was
another brand marketed to children
on the Saturday morning radio shows.
My shoes were another pair my dad got for me.
After all, his
favorite fishing buddy needed the right kind of foot gear.
