Sneaking around

After about six-plus months in the gym, it is time for that big move for me. New shoes. I did find the right red track pants and I have discovered a cache of T-shirts I never remembered I had, but I never really bothered about shoes, except that they needed to be on the right feet. But then my trusty old sneakers decided that they needed a break, almost literally, and have slowly been disintegrating. It is indeed unfortunate, as I would say in a very formal statement, that just when they are getting to that stage when they are supremely comfortable and are perfect to bash around in, they need to be put aside for walks in the slush or treks to the vegetable market or the like, while new, pristine and probably painful…at least until they have been properly broken in, by which time I would need to start the process all over again…shoes will need to be acquired and carefully looked after.

Having yielded to the inevitable, I decided that I had to take a deep breath and go for it, and hence the research began. I got advice from my trainer and from my soul sister, who is more a gym bunny than I will ever be. Get nicely padded soles, they both mandated, since those would help cushion my knee while I huffed and puffed along on the treadmill or did the dreaded step-ups or marched along solemnly as my gym coach counted – and cheated, and not to my advantage. Get shoes that are supportive of your ankle, Father said, while another friend suggested I aim for footwear that will not only last, but be affordable. Look for red, my inner self demanded, since that is a favourite colour. You better get something that looks good, someone else suggested, or else you will never like your feet while you work out and that is so not happening!

Completely confused, as I am wont to get, I dropped the whole idea for a few months. Until my shoes started protesting and even I could not stand to look down at my feet for too long. Strangely, it was around this time that it seemed as if everyone else in the gym had been shoe shopping and had spanking new sneakers, with lots of bells and whistles and colourful tabs attached. I was vaguely self-conscious and got out the brush and a damp cloth and cleaned up my shoes when I got home. But that was not enough. With every wipe, a little more leather – or was it? – peeled off and instead of getting shinier, the footwear seemed to show up all its shabbier spots. I steeled my inner self to ignore my fashion solecism and went on…running on the treadmill was easier with comfortable shoes, I told myself and huffed another minute longer than my track record (and, yes, breathing heavily does bring out the worst humour in all of us). And then it was inevitable. I could feel things through my soles and along the sides of my shoes. The inside cushioning was wearing out and that was just not a good state to be in. I could feel the impact of each step push a greater amount of pressure through to my hip and with a bad knee, it was not a good thing at all.

So once again the research was begun. For the last few days I have been in and out of more sports shops than I ever did in my whole life, even when I was in college and chilling out at the mall with my soul sister who wears and knows about more sports shoes than I know about red lipstick, which is plenty. While she would step in and out of shoes that you could run in, walk in, aerobicize in, calisthenicize in (yeah, well, I can make up words too, you know!), cycle in (she tends to prefer two wheels to two legs, for some strange reason) and do goodness knows what else in, I would wander off to wiggle my toes in gorgeous footwear that, who knows why, almost always tended to be red, strappy and raised four inches above the ground at the back, lifted on what could have sewn a hem on the finest muslin petticoat. Flat and I were not sole-mates.

But for now, I forge on with my investigations. I have seen more ugly shoes than ever before, with red stripes on grey, pink and blue chevrons, black and purple bubbles (for air, madam, the sales-boy told me a I gazed on in horror) and who knows what else in the way of colour, embellishment and ‘aerodynamic technology’. When I demand a plain white pair with no more than perhaps the manufacturing company logo, I am given all sorts of excuses, from the shoes not being suitable for gym workouts to them not being available in my size – okay, so that one is vaguely credible. And I find that ugliness and price are directly proportional, since the worse the shoes look, the more they seem to cost. But I have not given up or lost my faith in humanity, at least that section of it that designs sports shoes. Somewhere there is a pair of simple, neat, functional and entirely suitable sneakers waiting for me, without any stripes, bands, patches, chevrons or any other decoration, nice padded and cushioned on the inside, perfectly fitting my feet. All I would need to do is try them on and buy them, hopefully to last a while.

My search continues…