Big Shoes to Fill
The time has come to retire a beloved pair of shoes. I can think of no better day to do so then today, which would have been my dad’s 70th birthday. Now- I understand that this isn’t the 1950’s and we wear shoes for a grand total of about 6 months nowadays. But you know that favorite T-shirt everyone has? Or those one pair of blue jeans that fit so good you just have to shake your backside with reckless abandon to “Twist and Shout?” Maybe a blazer that has you talking in the mirror like Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs?
Well I have a pair of shoes of that equivalence. For about a decade- I absolutely, positively, cannot fathom life without them. A pair of moccasins. And if you’ve seen me in the last nine years, I was probably wearing them. They have been resoled not once but twice, and I can feel the gentle worn impression of leather scooping around each of my toes. They have been to fine places in the world including the ancient streets of Croatia and Italy, the infamous stranded by Bosnia incident, the Guinness brewery in Ireland, the Mayan ruins of Mexico, on a sailboat in the Adriatic Sea, and the rocky beaches of Canada’s Fundy Bay. They have been my faithful companions on countless airplanes along with a stick of Beeman’s tucked under the left tongue. The right shoe furiously held down the gas pedal of dad’s Honda Pilot through dark desert highways as warm smells of …cigars… rose up from the air. The suede fringe has brushed the soil and snow in numerous national parks and vacations with my dad and my family. They’ve had beer spilled on them at Red Rocks, tears from a Stevie Nicks show, and even absorbed the wailing echos of Chuck Berry’s voice at Blueberry Hill.
But as Mr. Frost so eloquently states, “Nothing gold can stay.” I learned news of his death while on vacation in California wearing these fabled Mocs. Summer turns to Autumn, life blooms again in the Spring, and Dad becomes a whisper in the air that fills my lungs with breath for new adventures.
After scouring the vast depths of the Internet, I managed to track down a replacement pair of my now discontinued Mocs. And I think the first thing I’m going to do in them is celebrate the past by drinking an ice cold Mexican Coca Cola, watch the sunset, and toast to the future whilst listening to The Last Waltz.
Fun fact of the day: the gift my dad bought my mom on their first date was a pair of Minnetonkas. I don’t think he was planning on pulling a Cinderella moment with that stunt but he raised one hell of a princess and needless to say- the shoe fits. Happy 70th Birthday, Dad.
