The pair from the flyer

As planned, I headed out of the house at 7:20 am yesterday morning, with a new appreciation for leaving the house kids-free. I had nothing, but myself and my purse (note: PURSE, not diaper bag!!) over my arm. (okay, and my makeup bag, because the car is still the best place for applying it). I had no cute bento snacks packed. I had no sippy cups. I had no diaper and wipes, no extra clothing, no blankie and choochie, and no little books or toys. It was me again. Just me again. And it was so easy to walk out.

I arrived at the shoe sale to a lineup longer than my wide angle lens could capture; longer than I could see the end of; longer than I ever imagined. But, with my new attitude and excitement just at being alone, I had no problem with the thought of joining the masses.





Behind me stood one of only two men that I could see. He was accompanying his wife, who claimed that it was HIM who wanted shoes. Not too likely, partner. Admit it, you're whipped.

You couldn't pay B.Rube enough money to join me at a 8 am shoe sale. even if it was 4 days later and 2 pm in the afternoon. even if he was promised special favours. even if I exchanged cleaning out the barns for a year. This was not the place for a man. That was clear.

When the line started moving forward about 20 minutes later, my heart started to pound a bit. I got a bit nervous about what was about to happen next. Mostly, it was the unexpectedness of things and the crowd. Out loud, I said, "Wow. Did your heart just start pounding like mine?" to the few women around me. One of them answered with, " I know! It's crazy how excited we all get about shoes, eh?"

I was referring more to my agoraphobia, claustrophobia and fear of the unknown. but, yeah, shoes are pretty heart pounding too.

As we walked in, we were handed a large canvas bag, and were shuffled forward to the shoes. THE SHOES!!!

The racks were organized by size, not style. It took me a few minutes to find the 7-7.5 racks, mostly because I just needed to take a moment before jumping in. By that time, most of the shoes had already been scooped up into someone else's bag. The protocol was that you just grabbed every possible shoe that you liked (or didn't really like) that may (or may not) fit you and threw it into your bag and continued up the aisle. Within minutes, these women had 50 pairs of shoes each in their bags, and were headed for the chairs.

Now, understand, I went to the sale to buy the one pair of shoes that I'd seen in the flyer. As I reached the end of the first 7-7.5 aisle, I realized that the likelihood of this was dwindling.

I muttered to the woman next me at that particular moment, "I guess there's no chance in hell that I'm going to find the pair that I wanted from the flyer, is there?" She smiled sympathetically, "ummm...no. Probably not."

I don't wear heels often. I just needed a new pair of black ones. I bought a brown pair that I loved last year. I now wanted a black pair. Having abandoned the idea of finding that pair from the flyer, I settled on a couple of others to try on.

Neither of them fit perfectly, but both of them were alright - both kinda cute in their own way. One was a little big; the other a little small. I kept searching the piles for the other pair.

(For, you see, all of the 50 pairs of shoes that each person brought to the chairs to try on that didn't fit or otherwise make the cut, were now lying in huge heaps around the store. ) There were shoes everywhere. and they were all different sizes, all mixed up. What a nightmare. I didn't find that pair. Not in my size, not in a colour other than black, not even in some other size. nada.



I settled on the two that I had.

And got up to check out the purses, sunglasses, tank tops, skirts, tops, and shorts (all of which I also purchased!!!) and almost tripped over a pair of shoes. I looked down.

and you know it.... it happened again....unbelievably true..... the pair from the friggin' flyer!
"Now, what were the chances that they were my size?", I thought to myself.

With my track record this past week, pretty damn good, I'd say!

I slipped my foot into them.

Like Cinderella placing her foot into the glass slipper. You better believe they fit.