Stilettos

“You put high heels on and you change.”

Manolo Blahnik

Back when I was growing up and attending public school, girls had to wear dresses. Because there were five of us kids and no money to speak of. Shopping for “going back to school” clothes consisted of one morning in late summer where each of us three girls would stand at the end of our beds in age order - me in the middle,

and my mother would start with my older sister.

She would go through the dresses she had and if they no longer fit her or my sister adamantly refused to wear one, invoking a huge argument which was won by the one that held out the longest, my mother would then take it and drop it in a pile on the floor in front of me. Next, she would move on to my clothes and follow the same process whereby my younger sister would inherit my hand-me-downs, whether it was because I had outgrown them or they were being passed on because she needed a few more dresses. I never challenged any decision made. No real discussions, mostly yes and no answers to the same question. Does this fit? What do you mean you don’t like it, what’s wrong with it? You're wearing it.

Once the clothes had been reassigned, the only other clothes anyone could hope for was if they were lacking in something critical, deemed only by my mother or we got a bag from our Aunt of our cousin's hand-me-downs and so it went from year to year. And fashion, what was that? We were lucky to keep up with any kind of wardrobe, regardless of what era it was from. My sister told me recently, while we were sharing cherished childhood not-so-nice memories, that she had wanted a pair of white go-go boots for the longest time, years, and kept asking for them. When she finally got the boots - maybe four years later - they were already out of style. She had to wear them anyway. I was forced into saddle shoes and I remember my feet so swollen, red, and blistered from a new pair that were way too small for my feet and my mother, sitting me on top of the kitchen table and forcing them on with a shoehorn. I remember how much that hurt and how hard it was to walk but I never said a word. I knew better.

By the time I got to Junior High, they had eased the pants rule for girls and were allowing us to wear them, but only on Fridays, no jeans. However, I remember missing part of that emancipation because I did not own pants that were not jeans. Sigh.

I started babysitting at 13 and with some of the money I would make, I would buy a piece of clothing here or there, nothing exciting or extravagant, just something I needed. Like a sweater or a shirt. But that wasn’t to last too long. It seemed that I would only have them for new, one time, and once they went into the wash, some mysterious alchemy would occur to alter their state. My mother would yell with glee for me to come down in the basement where she would be laughing and holding up what used to be my new piece of normal size apparel, but only now big enough to fit an infant, or a doll. She always claimed she didn’t know how that happened while all giddy and I never found any of it funny and after a while, I stopped buying anything that was not jeans and flannel shirts. That is all I wore, rounded out by a pair of very worn desert boots. For some reason, jeans and flannel didn’t shrink and I never had to stand before her, defeated by her taking another thing away from me that I tried to have for myself. By the time I got to High School, it was jeans every day, for everyone; the pants rule for girls was thrown out altogether. If you wanted, of course, and that was ok with me.

I met Jeannie in my junior year of nursing school, she was a year ahead of me but we didn’t start hanging out together until a year or so later when we found each other on a bowling league, different teams and she wanted to meet my boyfriend’s best friend who looked like one of the Doobie Brothers. At some point, J got a part-time job at a clothing store in the mall and she begged me to come and let her pick out some clothes for me; she was absolutely not a fan of my wardrobe and would mention it from time to time. I will never forget that day when I agreed to do this mad clothing makeover more to support her new job and help her with her commission quota; Jordache, Sasson, Bonjour, and Gitano jeans were the rage and I never heard of any of them. So I stood in the dressing room while she handed me these new fancy jeans and blouses, ugh. Blouses I definitely did not like. I couldn’t pull these “designer” jeans up all the way with ease, it wasn’t like throwing on a pair of Levis. And as I struggled to get them up onto my hips and then close them, she told me I should lie on the floor to zip them up. What? Are you kidding me?

“No”, she told me, “that’s how you put them on.”

Well, I did buy one pair of those fancy jeans on a compromise, buying a size larger than she was telling me my size was so I could zip them standing up, and I bought a black leather jacket which I really liked and it did look way better than my flannel. And there I was, two items nicer but still not giving my wardrobe much thought. And maybe it was because I really couldn’t afford much at that point, paying for a car, insurance, gas, dentists, and so on. Clothes were not on the top of the list. And did they really need to be? I was a nurse back then and we wore uniforms all of the time. So for the little time I was in regular clothes, what I had was good enough. I embraced my fashion “don’t” completely. No shame.

At some point, I left nursing and clothes became more essential. I also moved into new jobs, put myself through college, part-time evenings, countless moves, and then moved to another state and was gradually doing better for myself. First came the upgrade in food, and then came the upgrade in clothes. I do not remember when I actually flipped totally on the other side of the spectrum but it was not gradual. One day I looked clean and casual and the next, extremely feminine. It was as if I could finally embrace my inner spirit and I did it with great passion. I loved dresses and skirts and blouses; who would’ve thought! I coordinated colors in my clothes, undergarments, and accessories. But I will never forget the way I felt, that feeling I experienced, that took over me, when I stepped into my first pair of stilettos. Oh my.

I never went near my desert boots again. I wore stilettos everywhere and with everything. I loved the way they elevated you, drew down the line of your leg, made you stand straight up, arched at the foot, leg muscles tight, feeling so strong, oh the power. I loved the way they would make a declaration as I walked along; a distinct clap, clap, clap on the pavement. In those shoes, I moved differently, stood different, talked different, was different.

Last year when we were all sent to lockdown, put away were the dresses, the skirts, and high heels. Gone was the noise that your high heels made as you walked through the parking lot, the store, the restaurant, your house. I, like the rest of the remote employees of the world, reverted to jeans or leggings, loose shirts, and flip-flops, of all things. I did get dressed when I would escape once in a while to my girlfriend’s, who was also doing lockdown by herself; jeans and a sweater or top but no heels. From time to time I would think about all of my beautiful shoes, standing at attention, tall and strong, patiently and without complaint, waiting for their turn to walk out into the world, but lately I was convinced that after all this time out of heels, and lower to the ground, there was no way I could walk in them anymore, not balanced, not poised. It would probably be painful in more ways than one.

This past week, I had an interview scheduled for a job and I started to think about what I was going to wear. I opened up the closet and started looking at all of my dresses hanging there, but then my eyes were averted to the floor where all my beautiful stilettos stood side by side. Dare I?

I bent over, grabbed the closest pair and threw off my flip-flops. As I stepped into those shoes, I was overcome, filled with this strange, yet familiar sensation. I felt like Cinderella when she stepped into that glass slipper and it fit perfectly; it always belonged to her. And it all came rushing back, that striking feeling, back into my legs, into my body, that feeling of power, of stepping up and standing tall and walking with purpose, accompanied by a determined sound.

Oh, how I have missed that elevation.

Oh, how I have missed these shoes.

I kept those stilettos on for the whole rest of the day. Click, Clack.

As for the job, who knows, but my stilettos, priceless……..