A Memory for Mother's Day: My Mother's Shoes

 My mother was a tiny woman, barely five feet tall, with dark hair and blue eyes.  The youngest of six children, she grew up in an immigrant family in Omaha, Nebraska.  There were few luxuries for the sisters in their home.  Her one indulgence was shoes.  Once when she was a young girl, a shoe manufacturer remarked upon her small, pretty feet and asked her to model his brand of shoes.  Elated, she asked her mother for permission.  It wasn't granted.  In my grandmother's eyes, model equaled prostitute and in no way would she grant her daughter's request.

Mother grew up, married and moved to Austin, Texas, where she gave birth to my sister and me.  Although she dressed us in outfits from Neiman Marcus, lavished us with music lessons, dance lessons, tennis lessons, private preschool and elaborate birthday parties, she never spent much on herself.  Except for shoes.  Her love of footwear continued through her life.  She wore size 4B, the same size as shoe store samples, and she filled her closet with every sample she could find--high heeled pumps and sandals, white shoes and black, spectators and sporty wedges.  My sister's boyfriend once said, "Mrs. Dochen, you're the only lady I know that wears high heels in the kitchen."  Of course she did; they made her taller.

She gave me and my friends her old shoes and dresses to use in our endless games of dress-up. One of my friends was crestfallen when she outgrew Mother's sample size shoes.

High heels were her pleasure and in her old age, her downfall.  One day she tripped going up the stairs to the porch.  Her glasses fell off and the earpiece pierced her eye, leaving her partially blind.  She never wore high heels again.

When dementia stole her memory, her communication skills and her awareness of the world around her, my sister and I moved her to a nursing home.  There she wore ugly shoes, "old lady shoes" she would have called them if she'd been able to comment on them.

After the move, my sister and I cleaned out her house.  We saved her room for last.  When we opened the door of her closet, there were dozens of pairs of her shoes.  Memories of our mother's life, lined up two by two on her closet floor.