Coming from a place where the preferred footwear used to be none, I have always been bemused by the preoccupation with shoes. In magazines and on television are scores of shoe ads. Closets hold an array of shoes: low heels, mid heels, high heels, no heels; round toe, pointy toe, open toe; sling back, half back, no back. Straps? One across the foot top, two criss-crossing, one wrapped around the ankle, heading up the calf. And colors! More offerings than samples in a paint store.
Coming from a place where the preferred footwear used to be none, I have always been bemused by the preoccupation with shoes. In magazines and on television are scores of shoe ads. Closets hold an array of shoes: low heels, mid heels, high heels, no heels; round toe, pointy toe, open toe; sling back, half back, no back. Straps? One across the foot top, two criss-crossing, one wrapped around the ankle, heading up the calf. And colors! More offerings than samples in a paint store.
You think I’d be a fan of footwear because starting in the 1960s, my mother worked at Smart Shoe Shop on Front Street, putting shoes on all the feet in Hilo, Puna and the Hamakua Coast. People called her da shoe shop lady because she measured your foot to find just the right fit and provided socks if you didn’t have any. You plopped in a chair while she sat across on a footstool to lace up whatever you were trying on. You were then invited to stroll around the store, checking out the fit and squeaks and admiring your fancy feet in floor mirrors.
In those days, Smart Shoe dyed satin flats and heels to match whatever color swatch you brought in. My mother used to sew my clothes and I still remember a lavender and white polished cotton dress she made for Easter. She matched my satin flats to the exact shade of lavender and I looked like a painted Easter egg.
Later when I went off to college, Mom made sure I was well-shod in shoes practical enough for those long sprints from the dorm to the classroom, rain or shine, sun or snow.
No more dyed lavender flats!
Today, retired and back home, I hardly think about shoes. I’m barefoot at home and zori’d when I go out. To meet friends, I put on dress zori, the one with the shiny strap. I brought back a few high heels from Seattle but the last time I thought I should wear some, not only did my fat feet not fit — thanks to two scoop rice with mac salad — but when I finally wedged them in, I could hardly walk! If you see lovely black suede heels at the thrift shop size 6, they used to be mine.
Evidence of our barefoot tradition goes way back to old drawings and photos of Hawai‘i Nei. Even my first grade class picture at Riverside School shows mostly barefoot kids. Learning to shoe-walk was clearly less important than mastering Standard English.
Rumor has it that the thorny kiawe trees on the dry side of the island were planted by missionaries trying to convince Hawaiians to be as uncomfortable as they were by insisting on impractical cover-ups such as shoes, forgetting that those might be needed in New England but not here. Bare feet may not always be pretty but allow us to use toes to pick up objects. The BVD that missed the hamper? Grab it with your toes and dunk it in! The garden clippers on the grass? Poke your big toe in the handle loop and toss it in the bucket!
In pondering footwear, I’m thinking if the shoe-obsessed stop using toes to grasp — say, that pencil off the floor — won’t those lower digits eventually drop off, serving no purpose in the evolution of their human body?
Following this line of thought, won’t the shoeless, continuing to put toes to good use and thereby keeping them, thus remain the toed and therefore superior branch of the species?
I believe so.
Rochelle delaCruz was born in Hilo, graduated from Hilo High School, then left to go to college. After teaching for 30 years in Seattle, Wash., she retired and returned home to Hawaii. She welcomes your comments at rainysideview@gmail.com. Her column appears every other Monday.
