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January 10, 2001 |
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Let's talk about shoes. That's right. Shoes
Actually, I was having this discussion with Pam
about shoes. During vacation she and Aileen had ganged up on me about this
argument. She bought three pairs of shoes during vacation.
First, I would like to take the entire sexist argument out of the picture.
It is irrational for anyone male or female to accumulate shoes.
It may sound sexist because it is women who typically suffer from
this affliction. Shoes are a bit of a strange beast because everyone
obviously need at least one pair of shoes. Having said that I'll like to
point out that it makes little sense to accumulate shoes.
Now, I won't criticize owning shoes or even buying shoes.
Obviously, you wouldn't wear six inch spike heels camping or running shoes
to a formal affair, so there is a rational number of shoes that one can
own. Allow me to be more specific. Enumerate all the different types of
occasions which you would need shoes also take into account permutations of
different shoes with different outfits and different colors. Go ahead be
overestimate a bit to account for anything you have forgotten. Bump up the
number a little more to account for spares. I'll wait. [tapping
fingers…] Okay, finished? This number represents the number of
shoes you need. Listen very carefully, buying any more would be
excess.
In many respects, shoes are like cars, you only really need so
many of them to account for different purposes, after that is a waste of
money and space. There's a saturation point, going past it is a practice
in futility. I personally have a tough time trying to conceptualize the
need for 30 pairs of shoes, though this is probably because I have a tough
time grasping the idea that there would be that many different
situations where what I wore on my feet would be of instrumental
importance. If I were ever to see Imelda Marcos's collection of 1220 pairs
of shoes, my head would probably explode.
Now, I don't have anything against shoes in particular… I like shoes.
Shoes are my friends. It's just the perception that there's always a need
for more shoes that I can't agree with. Face it, buying and accumulating
shoes is a hobby. It's okay, you can say it. I mean, many other folks
have perfectly good hobbies, watching football for instance. That's a
hobby. It's done purely for pleasure, there's not need to buy
more shoes, just like there's no need to watch football.
This is like the folks who like fishing… who rationalize that they're
getting food. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a fisherman, however,
I'll be willing to bet that once you calculate the cost for the boat,
equipment, transportation, and meals (en route), you'll come to find that
you'll have to eat an awful lot of fish to really offset the expense. Or
maybe you really like fish.
Okay, and finally a few rules of thumb to determine if you have
too many shoes:
- If you routinely search through several boxes to find the right pair, you have too many shoes.
- If you have to ask which one you should wear, you have too many options. You have too many shoes.
- If you look at closet space for your shoes whenever looking for apartments, you have too many shoes.
January 10, 2001