CHEAP SHOES
2/28/03. 1:34am CST. Home.

I love the black boots, but they are officially retired. In fact, all my shoes have got to go.

My feet are a freaking mess.

Most days it hurts to walk, at least in the morning. I try to hide it, and I think I've gotten pretty good, but I really don't know how successful I am at it.

I get home, the first thing I do is kick off the shoes. Then fight the urge to scratch the soles raw. Right now as I type I'm sort of absent-mindedly scraping them, thru the socks, against the bottom shelf of my computer stand. I lie awake for at least an hour every night trying not to notice how much they itch, how much they hurt.

It's not anything so simple as athlete's foot. Frankly, I'm not sure what it is this time. Just lousy feet, I guess.

They go well with the ankles that have been cracking since I was 12 and the knees that hurt for an hour after a 10-second crouch. It's amazing that I can ride a bike without the entire lower half of my body disintegrating.

Anyway, the worst time was my freshman year of high school. I had what I thought were really great high-tops to wear for basketball games (that was the athletic year). And my feet got ruined. They turned white. They smelled terrible. There was so much dead flesh at the bottom of each one that I started cutting holes in them to see how deep it went. I don't know what possessed me to explore like that, maybe just my always-morbid curiosity. One night I dug into one heel nearly half an inch. I couldn't feel a thing at the time, but by morning it hurt like hell.

Still, it was another month before I realized the problem might be the damn shoes. I wasn't exactly quick on the uptake in those days. I was, however, terrified to tell anyone about my feet or my shoes, so I lived with it until the next time my Mom offered to get me some new ones.

Shoes, I mean. Although new feet would have been welcome too.

In college I got a plantar ("planter's") wart in my right foot that nearly destroyed my arch. Some days I could feel the thing clenching, like a living creature in there, which in a way is sort of what they are I guess. Hurts like hell when it does that, which in my case was once or twice a day. At night I used to dig at it with nail clippers, trying to cut it out, which you aren't supposed to do because it makes them expand.

I spent a couple months getting liquid nitrogen treatments. They take a big q-tip looking thing, dip it in liquid nitro, and SHOVE the thing into the plantar wart. Basically boring a hole into your foot. Again, since I'd done that myself once, it didn't creep me out too much. Plus the nitro freezes the area on contact, so it didn't really hurt.

It also didn't work. That summer I continued my own treatment, trying unsuccessfully to cut the thing out, and limping a lot. I also swam a lot in the highly-chlorinated pool at the camp where I worked. One day after a particularly long swim, I dug at that grabby little bastard one more time, and somehow the whole damn thing came out. Completely. Left a big gaping maw in the middle of my foot, but it also left behind pure unadulterated foot flesh. By the end of the summer my feet were completely normal. For once.

Couple years ago they got all screwed up again. Cracked, itchy, painful, the usual stuff. I spent a couple months moisturizing them every morning before work, and every night before bed, and somehow got them back in one piece again.

And, to continue tradition, it all started again a few months ago, probably right about the time I started wearing the boots again.

This time I'm pretty damn sure it's the shoes. Which is a shame, because I love these things. But I guess it would be in my best interest now to get some new ones.

Shoes, boots, feet, whatever.

Aw yeah, this was a great thing to write about tonight. Women are gonna be all over me once this gets out.

(Throwing themselves at these horrible feet of mine.)