From the height of my heels

2024 Author: James Gerald | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 14:00

And so I stand in a shoe store and almost cry. Can't choose shoes. I try on beautiful shoes with a round toe and golden embroidery, with high heels, in a retro style that is fashionable today. I take them off. Trying on others - pretty cute low-heeled shoes. I also take pictures of them. A saleswoman with the intelligent face of a demoted professor quotes Dior to me: "It's all about the shoe: there are heels on which the legs rest." I listen to her and cannot decide that this is not a choice of shoes, but, at least, marriage.

I have no money with me for both pairs. And are both needed? High heels are sexy. It is immediately evident - a real woman. A low heel or even a flat sole is comfortable. Immediately evident - a workaholic. “What if it's not just buying shoes,” it comes to my mind, “but a choice of lifestyle? in the evening?"

All women are divided into those who wear high heels and those who do not. Heels determine consciousness: they are not a part of a shoe or even an accessory, it is a whole philosophy.

“When a model comes to the beach in a bathing suit and tennis shoes, no one will look at her twice. But if she is in high heels, then everyone turns their heads after her,” says photographer Helmut Newton, and you cannot argue with this offensive truth.

Shoes from Prada, Gucci, Nina Ricci, and much more budget options, but with the same heel height (you can't argue with trendsetters) - what is it? They gracefully walk to the car, sit in coffee houses during the day, drink cocktails with a cherry in the evening. They are worn by city fairies who have the whole world at their feet. They are not "scratched to work, as if piles are being driven." They do not have to worry about feeding a large family all day. Either a princess or a dirty little girl - nothing personal.

“I stopped wearing heels because by the end of the day I want to cut them off,” says one friend of mine, and I understand her. But you have to decide something!

In medieval France, the height of the heel spoke eloquently about the estate of its owner: the higher the heel, the more noble the lady. Since then, a lot has changed, and we are not in Paris, but as for the heels, everything is exactly the same. It is necessary to take a clear position and no longer bend the soul: heels are like heels, soles are like soles. Let's approach it rationally. A high heel visually lengthens the legs, makes the figure slimmer and adds height. For a long time I thought that I was of average height, but in fact, I have it, like the cannibal Ellochka. So getting a cut taller is only useful for me. On the other hand, I was raised when "being a cut above" meant having an intellectual edge. And here I am, all with two higher educations, and I can not decide to become taller in the literal, in the most literal sense, because on heels I feel about the same as on a stepladder. It's very sexy to be on a stepladder all day.

Psychoanalysts, to whom it has become fashionable to listen, argue that all our problems are rooted in the past. Let's turn around and see. And exactly, as they looked into the water - I once faced a similar dilemma.

Long ago, in love, I flew to the monument to Pushkin (what a banality!) In heels. I wanted to impress. And she did it. "Let's go to Peter?" - said the chosen one dreamily. "Right now?" - I specified."Right now!" He replied. Here it is necessary to make a lyrical digression. All Muscovites think that a spontaneous trip to St. Petersburg is terribly romantic. Who founded this tradition is unknown, and even the reasons for it, in general, have not been established, but it is more alive than all living things. Such is the specificity of local urban everyday life, such as visiting an exhibition on the closing day or discussing the quality of mojito in any of the capital's establishments.

I stood near Pushkin, who had already seen everyone, and thought: "Well, where am I going now? I have no laptop with me, no cosmetics, no credit card, not even a toothbrush - and that one is gone!" "But there are heels and a man," the insidious thought tempted me, "and what else does a true lady need?" And there was a night train, and Peter, and walks along Nevsky Prospekt, and endless halls of the Hermitage, and the geometric lines of Vasilyevsky Island, and the light surf of the Gulf of Finland … on heels, on heels, on heels! “Honey, - I sat down on the nearest shop and took off my shoes, - I won't go anywhere else from here. I will be fed by passing tourists. Farewell.” Seeing such despair, the frightened man specified my shoe size and disappeared in an unknown direction.

An hour later, I became the owner of the most wonderful, as it seemed to me then, shoes - sneakers. I again became cheerful and not indifferent to the beauties of the city, although not so mysterious in the eyes of a noticeably saddened man.

Since then, I managed to throw away those St. Petersburg sneakers, buy new ones, change a man and even, it seems, become a feminist. “It’s important how I look in my own eyes, not in men’s eyes,” I thought. Comfortable shoes have taken a firm place in my wardrobe, gradually replacing giant heels and thin stilettos from there. I even found a scientifically sound argument: Norwegian scientists have found that constant walking in high-heeled shoes leads to a slowdown in thought processes. Who wants to be a stupid blonde?

"To me! - it suddenly occurs to me. - I have long wanted to be a stupid blonde, followed by men admiringly. To whom women passing by are jealous, comforting themselves with probable intellectual superiority. Which is first a woman, and only then - everything else."

… And I bought those shoes. Well, in high heels. I cannot say that this choice is perfect. But the first man I met crashed into a tree: he was staring.