Fun Feet!

I hand-wrote a note to myself about this post - outline form - listing the stories I wanted to share. Unfortunately, my handwriting is horrible! Therefore, when I picked up the paper with the notes - planning to type them into the computer - the note's title read: "My Fur Feet".

Well, yuck! Actually it read: "My Fun Feet", but like I said, my handwriting is horrible. The last thing I want is fur feet! Zura made a comment back in the "Inadequate Eyelashes" post (which is actually titled MLB and Late Night TV - but I think of as the "Inadequate Eyelashes" post) about eyelashes showing up on our feet at a certain age and ohhhhh, I so do not want that.

My feet have "issues", they don't need any extras like fur. Enough about the fur already - this post is about flat feet. I have flat feet. Really flat feet (a podiatrist once got teary-eyed looking at them, I kid you not!), my kids have flat feet as well - and we can trace the blessing at least as far back as my dad who supposedly was booted out of the paratroopers when they found out he had flat feet.

Amusingly, back in the Stride Rite and Buster Brown days, I took each of my kids to the shoe store and asked (hoping against genetics) the shoe salesman: "Does this one have flat feet?" He'd (it was always a he??) look at my kid's platypus-like feet, up at my innocent, hope-filled face and say: "Yes!" with a tone that conveyed snottiness. He might as well have said: "Ya think, moron?"

Mine are the worst though. I say that because I am competitive. And also because it's true. If you took someone up to the top of the Eiffel Tower and dropped them, feet first, to the ground they still wouldn't have feet as flat as mine. Of course,  then they'd have problems that would make flat feet seem wonderful.

And that's where I'm going with this post - not to drop someone off the Eiffel Tower - good heavens, what do you take me for? I'm going to talk about how flat feet are not such a terrible problem - I can do some pretty cool things with my flat feet. Like:

Every morning when I get up I foot-sweep the hall from my bedroom to the living room. I'm not thrilled with having to sweep first thing in the morning. And I'm too lazy to bend down with a duster at that hour, but our oil burner (hot water) is in a cabinet in the hall - and somehow this causes an immense amount of dust to build up in a very short time. If enough of the dust builds up around the oil burner it gets sucked in and we have a soot-spitting problem.

I'm telling you - we have lots of dust. We don't have dust bunnies, we have dust warrens! So bright and early every morning, doing Soot-Stop Patrol, I spread my old foot squarely on the hall floor and do a circular sweep of the area and we're safe for another day. What I do with the foot-swept dust is: push it under a chair - then I come back later, when I am awake enough to bend over without falling, and sweep it up properly. But that's got nothing to do with this post, I just felt I should confess.

Anyway - try foot-sweeping with your 'ole arched foot and see what it gets you, I bet you'll miss half of the dust!

I do another cleaning trick with my feet as well. My granddaughter loves this one! When she sleeps over and we pile into Auntie's (Slightly-Brit) bed for storytime I get in last and perform my sole-cleansing ritual.

I sit at the edge of the bed and bring my knees up and out (like sitting meditation - but they're kind of levitated and my calves aren't crossed), put my soles together and brush them vigorously back and forth rubbing off dust before putting my tootsies in the bed.

Slightly-Brit says I look like a deranged cricket. Little Princess (granddaughter) just laughs - every time. Often she'll shout with glee: "Look, Auntie!" And I can't resist glee or any easy laugh, so sometimes I'll do this repeatedly (and hey, it's good for the thighs).

Last, but not least, of my fun-with-feet adventures is the foot slapping sound. It's fun to make noise. The houses I lived in as a kid and the one I've lived in most of my adult life all have cement subflooring. That's because they had radiant heat through the floors (lovely idea, but then pipes don't last forever, do they?). So I grew up barefoot year round - it's still hard for me to wear slippers even though we have a different type of heat now (damn, that concrete makes the flooring cold - even up through tile and carpet!).

The foot slapping sound is unparalleled in houses with wood subflooring - you just can't beat the thwack/thud noise that feet (and most particularly flat feet) make on a tile floor over concrete subfloor (and really there has to be a better way to say that, but I can't figure it out). I've perfected the thwack thing - I love making that noise. I'm not a dancer, but I can do a cool little hey-look-at-me-I-think-I'm-a-tap-dancer kind of thing on the kitchen floor!

And here's the best part - Manchild hates it!! Why? I have no idea, but he does. And if there's anything half as fun as glee or an easy laugh, it's agitation. So - thwack thumpity thwack thwack - haha - not often a parent can agitate a 19 y/o.

And here we are - it's Body-Part Wednesday again and I'd love to hear from YOU. Have you got a foot story, or photo or art piece to share? Consider putting your story (or photo or art piece) on your blog and linking to it in our comments. Or comment away IN the comments. Just please be part of the party!! And remember, since we're Square-Peg here - you really don't need to follow the rules - we're not so fond of rules - so, though this week's theme is feet - share anything!

Comments

[Zura]

I just wanted to encourage you, Karen, and your readers to have a look at my Happy Feet class. It's only three weeks long, and you can learn to paint your own designs on any shoes!! It doesn't matter if you have flat feet or not :) To find out more about the fun go to http://creativeclown.com/classes.

[janie]

I remember my grandfather reassuring me that having big feet wasn't a disaster ... something about having a strong foundation to support the building (there was also some reference I can't repeat about no foundation being under the outhouse too). Last nite my granddaughter Nila put my shoes on over hers and started walking around the room, she could only take a step or two at a time and as cute as she is/was it was reassuring when my daughter told her that she'd grow up big enough to fill my shoes. And, in regards to your flat feet ... at least you don't have to worry about fallen arches and the images of you dusting were worthy of the laugh I got. And, as a consolation I can say that my sister, our mom and my daughter and I all wear the same size, so at least we have lots of choices in we ever need to share. too bad mom isn't into borrowing my daughters Doc Martins tho, they'd be quite the conversation at her assisted living home.

[Mary Ellen]

My feet are a little weird. Just a tiny bit weird actually and you might not even notice if I didn't tell you the story.
When I was 16 I dated a brilliant boy - smart as all heck, but missing the humanity & common sense keys, if ya know what I mean.

My nose had a little flat end to it, and I was quite flat-chested in those days. Most importantly,my small feet had tiny toes that were even & straight across (except for the big toe, thank heavens). My "sweetie" invented a story that I had roller-skated down a hill and landed flat against the house, and that was the cause of all my "flatness". That wasn't quite enough for him though, he would introduce me to people (usually a gaggle of boisterous Irish Aunts, Uncles & cousins) and launch right into the story as a way of personalizing me.

The romance was doomed (ya think??) but we did continue to be friends for XX+ years. Wouldn't you know several of his cousins ASKED me about my feet at his mother's funeral!

[Square-Peg Karen]

janie, Mary Ellen and Zura - you've got me smiling...Z - i bet that class is a hoot! As you know, I'm in your art-journaling one now-and i am LOVING it! Mary Ellen = ohman! i'm pretty glad you're sweetie is an EX sweetie..good thing that relationship was doomed because CAN YOU IMAGINE day to day living with him, yucky - ya think? lol..i bet your toes are adorable! janie (see, see, with the small "j"!!) I am racking my brain to think WHAT the outhouse part of that saying could be..i'm going to be thinking about that til i figure it out - i can almost see the little one putting her feet in your shoes..sweet..
oh, and over on facebook Jena responded to this post by saying that SHE cleans the floor with her feet -no, no, she actually said she USED to -if i have that right..lol..one to wet wipe, the other to dry- lol..Feet, beautiful feet..heading off grinning...thanks so much for commenting!!!!!!!!

[Danielle]

I actually have a great relationship with my feet. Yeah, they are rather large and very wide and my toes are comically long, but they are happy feet. They run around naked any time of the year as much as society will allow. And my hubby knows that the best way to get on my good side is to appeal to the all-powerful feet. :D

When I was a child I had a bad habit of tripping over my own feet as they grew (you just never knew how big they might be each day!) and this combined with my afore-mentioned "comically long toes" earned me the nickname "big toes" from my uncle, who persists in calling me that to this day. Needless to say, my feet hate Thanksgiving family gatherings.

[Square-Peg Karen]

; ) Love that you have a "great relationship with my (your - grin) feet" - and that you go naked alot feet-wise too...

"comically long toes" made me giggle - definitely a Fun Feet sound there!! except, i think my feet might want to run away from the Thanksgiving gathering too - boo to nicknaming unless it's one we choose!!

You mentioned tripping over your feet and that reminded me of kicking myself in the ankles..when i was a preteen..OFTEN..wierd..forgot about that..

bowing to those all-powerful feet! thanks for this!!

[Janíce]

Hey, I'm just glad I'm not the only one in the world who does that cricket-like sole cleansing ritual just off of the bed. ;)

[Square-Peg Karen]

Janice, YOU too? I thought I was the only one! Big smile!!!