Recently I had to buy new hiking shoes. To make sure I had a good fit, I went to a shoe store and had my feet digitally scanned and measured. I didn’t learn anything new. I have a very high arch and a very high instep–which have always made buying shoes a challenge. I was gifted my lovely feet by my paternal grandma.

When Grandma moved into a nursing facility, all her Grands were allowed to go through her home and choose one or two items before everything else went to estate auction. I made a beeline for a pair of her daily-wear shoes. An odd thing, I know. Some of my classmates called them ‘witch shoes’ and I can see why, but they never appeared that way to me because she, of course, wasn’t one. I wrote a poem about them, about all the ways and times I connected those shoes to my Grandma: standing at the kitchen sink washing dishes with Fels Naptha soap, the water so hot we couldn’t handle the plates to dry them; crossed at the ankle in her floral-print covered rocker crocheting or watching Lawrence Welk; tapping the floor beneath the Formica kitchen table playing euchre. Shoes solid, practical, with a bit of fancy when you looked close enough. Just like her.

While my feet came from my paternal Grandma, my pace came from my maternal one. She, my mom, my sisters and I all walk at a speed that makes it difficult for others to keep up. It’s not intentional, it’s genetic. Mom told me a story about when her younger brother was in elementary school. More than once on the way home, my uncle would toss his shoes over the fence of the factory where Grandma worked. Early the next morning, Grandma would have to go to North Electric, retrieve the shoes from the night watchman–who knew who the shoes belonged to–and get back home in time for my uncle to go to school. Then back to the factory before her shift began. My Grandma never learned to drive. She walked the several blocks between home and factory every day.

For a number of years, I walked in our annual CROP Walk. The motto, We walk because they walk, referenced the thousands of mostly women and children in Third World countries who walk miles daily for water. We walked rain or shine because they walk, rain or shine. We were aware we walked a token 3 miles, conversing, pushing our children in strollers–definitely not the same as those other moms balancing jars on their heads and carrying children swaddled at their chests. We never discussed what, if anything, they wore on their feet.

Visiting the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, it was the display of shoes at the end that finally brought the tears. The somber photos, exhibits, and placards with explanations built the emotion, but the shoes … all those hundreds of shoes. Big ones, tiny ones, worn and scuffed, newly polished … I thought of the feet that wore them, the hands that laced or buttoned them.

As I scribbled notes for this post about shoes and where my shoes were taking me, I thought of washing feet with Lent beginning next week. I once witnessed a real washing of the feet moment, not simply the reenactment of the Holy Thursday practice. I may have shared this before. Years ago, I was at mass in my hometown church, a large, old church with marble-tiled floors and where every sound gathers in the high arched ceiling. As we all reached hands across the aisle for the Our Father–we were allowed and encouraged to do that then–a baby bottle dropped on the floor, the sound of glass shattering reverberated to the choir loft. Fr. Tony stopped the prayer, asked if everyone was okay, and directed one of the altar servers to get a bucket and paper towels from the sacristy. When the boy returned, Father took the bucket and towels and proceeded down from altar area, knelt before the family and chatted with them as he cleaned up the mess. Bowed and kneeling with the ‘basin’, his vestments pooling around him was an image I’d seen in paintings for years. When the task was finished, he returned the items to the sacristy, washed his hands, and back at the altar simply said with a smile, “Let us begin again.”

Over the weekend one of my very favorite poets, Ted Kooser, posted a poem about shoe stores. I’d not thought about those when I started writing about shoes. We had two when I was growing up, Bennett’s and J&H (I think). Though I’m hazy on the name of the store, Mr. Dudley was the salesman for sure. I remember the white first shoes my sisters got, maybe even my own, and the pink bells that slipped over the knotted laces so we wouldn’t trip … and so mom and dad could hear where we were. My saddle shoes for kindergarten, and then again years later for cheerleading. I imagine both my Grandmas bought their shoes there, the ‘witch ones’ and the oxford ones for walking. Kooser wrote about the chairs, the stacks of shoe boxes, and the metal measuring tool. When I bought my latest shoes at REI, the salesman was helpful enough, but he never measured my feet, just took my word. Mr. Dudley would’ve never done that.

Often when a writer or poet sits down to write, the result isn’t what they initially intended. The words and images, like shoes, lead them to unexpected places, their characters say unexpected things. And we realize the story wasn’t about shoes after all.

I hope you have a terrific week wherever your shoes may take you! See you Monday with one of the places mine took me …