There comes a time for every large family when the hand-me-downs run out, the cheap plastic-shoe store doesn't have the right size and mother is forced to actually take her child shopping for new leather school shoes.
It's a big day for both mother and her child, who gets excited right down to his socks. The other day, after entering a local store to try shoes on my 5-year-old who will be starting kindergarten, I got the embarrassment of my life.After Jacob pulled off his worn-out, dusty Velcro-closure tennis shoes to have the sales clerk measure his foot, I was witness to the largest sock hole in the history of toe escapes. All five little piggies were winking back at me.
"Jacob," I said, turning red, "I told you to put on clean socks."
"I did, Mom," Jacob answered. "These are clean socks."
"Well, I meant good clean socks without holes in them," I said.
"Well, you didn't tell me that part," Jacob answered.
So Jacob proceeded to try on a pair of high-top L.A. Gear shoes with black and white shoe laces. He tried not to smile, but by the time the sales clerk finished lacing, Jacob was grinning from shore to shore and looked like a jet ready for takeoff.
"You like those, don't you?" I said.
Jacob nodded.
"Can I try 'em out? Huh? Huh?"
"Yes Jakie," I answered, "You can try them out."
Jacob jumped up and raced around the sale shoe racks, making a loud buzzing sound. Then he bolted from the store entrance and darted into the mall crowd. He came back red-faced, puffing and smiling.
"Mom, look at this," Jacob said. "These shoes make me run faster and jump higher! Watch!"
Jacob jumped up and down a zillion times, and I could tell by the look on his face that he knew that (with just a little wind in the right spots) he could fly.
Jacob usually wears his older brother's hand-me-down shoes or a cheap, plastic sale shoe from Payless. He's never had a real "in style" wing-dinger of a high-top dual-color-shoelace WOW pair.
Jacob insisted on holding the cardboard box enclosing his brand new shoes on his lap the whole way home from the store. When we finally did reach home, Jacob was out of that car like a bolt of lightning. He raced up the steps and burst through the front door.
After he plopped down on the family room floor, Jacob took the lid off the shoe box and suddenly stopped his frantic movements in mid-jerk. He looked down into the box and beamed as he carefully lifted each individual shoe from the box. Slowly he slid his feet one by one into the smooth leather whiteness. After lacing, tugging, adjusting and admiring his fancy shoes for several minutes, Jacob jumped up and slid back into the rocking chair. He spent the next half hour humming a tune and staring at his feet like a proud new mother.
Later, Jacob told me that he didn't want to wear his new shoes outside until the first day of school because he didn't want them to get dirty. These shoes are the only possessions that Jacob's ever worried about getting dirty in his entire five years of life.
After our family returned from vacation a few weeks after buying school shoes, Jacob bolted for the front door, ran down the hall and made a mad dash for the closet in his bedroom. We knew instantly what Jacob had missed the most. He quickly tore off his old shoes and slid his feet into his brand new hum-dingers. Then he ran down the hall, jumping higher and running faster all the way, sat down in the overstuffed rocking chair and hummed a song while he stared down at his new beauties.
I remember the days when I too really believed that brand new shoes could make me run faster and jump higher. I miss those days and sometimes wonder where they went and why I don't feel that way anymore. With Jacob around, I can almost remember enough to believe again.
The shoe store clerk sold me Jacob's shoes for 16 bucks. It's the best money I've spent in a long time.
(Janene Wolsey Baadsgaard is a Spanish Fork resident and mother of seven. She writes a biweekly column for the Deseret News Utah County edition.)