I Bought The Shoes

Diana Ferrari Mattea 

Yesterday while shopping we walked into one of many shoe shops.

‘Daisy you have such bad taste in shoes’, my sister said to me as we were browsing. ‘Excuse me, how rude’, I replied to her, ‘my shoes are wonderful, how can you say that.’ ‘Easy’ she said, ‘Just look at them’. We all look down at my feet, my two sisters, the sales assistant and I. ‘What?’ I say as they all turn away and say nothing. ‘What is wrong with my shoes? These are great shoes, I love these shoes.’ I look toward the sales assistant with longing in my eyes, thinking she would back me up as I knew my other sister wouldn’t support me. But to my horror, the sales assistant says ‘they could be nicer!’

My shoes are black leather sandals, ‘since when are sandals horrible. Besides they are comfortable, shouldn’t shoes be comfy?’ I say in my defence. ‘Comfy and practical is fine if you are an old lady, but you are not an old lady, so they are horrible. Here try these shoes on’, my sister says with a big smile and a giggle as she hands me a pair of flats to try.

As I am checking out the shoes she had given me, she hands me 3 more pairs saying ‘come on, smile, this is fun’ and asks the sales assistant if she has my size in all these shoes. As I sigh and sit down, more shoes are thrown my way and the sales assistant comes back balancing nine shoe boxes in her arms.

The first pair of shoes I try on cost $130 and I gasp and say to no one in particular, yet to the whole shop... ‘Are you mad, these shoes cost $130! My sister looks at me and says, ‘so? They are beautiful, it’s not about the price, it’s about how they look and they look fabulous’.

I tried on what seemed like every pair of shoes they had in that shop before everyone had agreed on which pair of shoes I should buy. I tried on purple and red and black, both patent and regular. I tried on flats and wedges and heels. The cheapest pair was $95 but most were priced at $130.

Of course I had no say in the shoes I would buy and everyone was debating on how many pairs I should buy. They had decided on the wedding shoes but as my taste in shoes was so bad, should I buy 2 or 3 pairs in total so that I could throw out those hideous shoes I usually walk around in. Erm, 3 pairs at $130 each, I don’t think so. So I decided for them. I would take just the one pair from here, the wedding shoes, ‘that’s a start, isn’t it’, I say with that same false smile on my face that my sister had when she told me how horrible my shoes were just an hour earlier.

I don’t know how I did it, but I only left with one pair of shoes. As I dragged my tired body from shop to shop to shop, I must have tried on 50-60 pairs of shoes, easily. ‘We’ had found another pair of ‘must have’ shoes for me but luckily, I mean unluckily they were not in my size. Unfortunately I had to order them, in both regular and patent and I am dreading the day that phone call comes from the shoe shop. But as my sisters will NOT be around when it comes, I will find an excuse not to go back and buy them.

The only good thing about shopping was that I did manage to talk them out of forcing me to wear a frilly dress as in the end they could see that me running around with 3 cameras around my neck in heels and a frilly dress would kinda look ‘uncool’. So, one small victory to me, well, it was a huge victory actually but not in the whole scheme of things as my two fashion obsessed sisters were far from finished with me yet.

After six long exhausting hours of shopping, of trying on thousands of pairs of shoes, hundreds of items of clothing and being dragged sometimes forcibly into shops or change rooms, we had finally finished for the day. I had gotten out of it lightly having only bought those one pair of shoes and one shirt.... country road, no sleeves, $99... Am I insane? That shirt was not even for the wedding, it was an ‘everyday’ shirt, because, you guessed it, ‘Daisy, you have such bad taste in clothing’.

My sisters mean well, I think. I am the ‘baby’ so they think they have a duty to boss me around, even at this age. Even when I am 50 I can guarantee they will feel the need to ‘dress me’. I am not like them, I don’t need to have this seasons fashion items or latest accessories. Ugg don’t get me started on the chains and jewellery I had to try on to complete the outfits.

My husband and I live ‘comfortably’ and I could afford to spend all that money on clothes and shoes if I wanted to, but seriously, I neither feel the need to nor desire to buy, buy, buy. I am a jeans girl, I love my jeans, I will always love my jeans. I will never be like my sisters and I am happy to be the odd one out.

My sisters look at me and shake their heads, but I look at them and shake my head too. If that was fun, shoot me now! Oh and the worse part, we haven’t finished shopping yet, I have to go back again... Nooooooooooooooooo