Shooing shoes

Well, I’ve done it. I’ve finally bought myself a new pair of black heels – nearly five and a half years after my last pair was purchased. I admit that this is something that should have been done a long time ago, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it until recently.

Only to be completely honest, I’ve not yet managed to throw away the old ones. Even though I know I should.

You see, the last time I bought myself a pair of heels was the day before Paul died*. They were pretty expensive and were also higher than any heels I’d ever owned before. But Paul insisted that I treat myself to something nice, and reminded me that we could, in fact, afford for me to spoil myself on occasion.

But he died early the following morning and never got to see me wear them. (My first time wearing them was at his funeral.)

As my only pair of proper heels, the shoes became my everyday heels. I wore them for work. I wore them to parties. I wore them to church and funerals and my master’s graduation. I wore them pretty much everywhere I needed to wear heels.

I didn’t not replace them because of Paul; I didn’t replace them because they were comfortable despite them falling to pieces. Although I do admit that every time I noted to myself that it was time to replace them, I remembered that lovely last day I had with Paul. And I suppose that stopped me from going shopping.

At the same time, however, I could hear Paul’s voice in my head telling me to stop being so cheap and to replace the tatty old shoes with new ones.

Which, as I mentioned before, I finally did. (It’s no coincidence that they look nearly identical to the old ones. After all, I really like the style.)

Anyhow, I told myself that as soon as the new shoes were broken in, I’d toss out the old ones. Only I haven’t actually done it yet. And I don’t fully know why.

I know it’s OK to throw them away. I know that they’re old and tatty and have no further use for me. And I know Paul would not be happy with my holding onto them.

But for some reason, each time I’ve gone to throw them out I’ve stopped myself. I don’t know if it’s because I’m parting with one of the very last things I purchased with Paul** or if there’s something about the overall memories of that last happy day. I just know that something is holding me back. (It could just be run-of-the-mill packrat behaviour, too.)

And that’s completely and totally ridiculous. It is. I know it. You know it. Everyone knows it.

Still… I hesitate. I guess it’s one of those weird 3.0 glitches.

But I’ve decided I’ll ditch them this month. (My housemate, who I’m sure will read this, will keep me honest on this. I hope.)

However, before I ditch them I’m going to use them as a practice piece for a cool shoe craft project. You see, I saw someone covering shoes with comics and decoupage and I thought it was a cool idea. So I’m going to try it.

***Update: I tried it on a different pair of shoes, which I wore for my PhD graduation on 4 July 2019. Read all about my thesis shoes here!***

If it works and looks good, I’ll keep the shoes***. If it works and my first attempt isn’t very good, I’ll ditch the shoes and will consider trying the process on another pair of shoes in the future.

* Actually, I bought a pair of heeled boots a couple of years back, but that’s a different type of footwear so I’m not counting them.
** The other things purchased that day were groceries (which have been eaten), a chain saw (which was sold when I said goodbye to our home), and some pieces for our Fiesta Ware collection (which are in storage, so at least I still have those!).
*** In which case my housemate no longer has to make me throw away the shoes.