"Mr. Bigfoot"

By Jerry Zezima

This pudgy piggy went to the shoe store.

This pudgy piggy did, too.

This pudgy piggy wanted flip-flops.

This pudgy piggy bought two.

This pudgy piggy cried OMG, all the way home!

And that, boys and girls, is the story of my recent footwear adventure.

It all began when my wife, Sue, said it was time for me to get a new pair of flip-flops because the ones I had been wearing for approximately the past decade were beginning to disintegrate.

I flip-flopped in rubbery comfort at the beach, the pool and around the house. I even ran errands and threw out the garbage in my airy size 11s, though I sometimes stubbed my big toe and let loose with so many F-words (“feet,” “footwear” and, of course, “flip-flops”) that the neighbors shut their windows and locked the doors.

Still, it was time to treat my tender tootsies to a new pair of slides.

I had referred to these light shoes as flip-flops, but my grandchildren, who are up on footwear fashion, set me straight.

Flip-flops, they informed me, have a Y-shaped strap with a little divider that goes between the big and second toes. I remember wearing them when I was their age. I also remember that they hurt like hell.

Slides have a vamp strap with no divider and are much more comfortable.

That’s what I was looking for when I went with Sue to the shoe store, where I also was looking for a pair of sneakers.

I met a friendly salesperson named Josh and couldn’t help but notice that he was wearing green shoes that looked like two patches of overgrown grass. They were more luxuriant than my front lawn.

“They’re Air Fleas,” Josh explained, adding that the style is called Cactus Plant Flea Market. “You can get them online,” he said.

“Don’t you dare order them,” Sue told me.

“Why not?” I said. “Then I can tell people I have fleas.”

Instead I asked Josh about sneakers — size 11, wide, which would probably fit Sasquatch — and he promptly found a box containing a pair of the kind I was looking for.

I tried them on and they fit like gloves.

“Maybe I should wear them on my hands,” I told Sue.

Then I asked Josh about slides.

“I don’t think size 11 will fit you,” he said. “They’re cut narrow.”

He went in the back and brought out three pairs, sizes 11, 12 and 13.

I took off my socks, exposing what Sue calls “the ugliest feet on earth,” and tried them on.

The first cut off blood flow in my instep. The second felt better, but my toes hung over the front edge. The third was just right.

“I’m actually size 13?” I marveled.

“In slides, yes,” Josh answered.

“I hope I don’t need a boating license,” I said.

The next day, Sue and I went to a pool club with two of our granddaughters.

“I like your slides, Poppie,” said the older one, who is 11. But mine, she pointed out, are black. Hers, which are new, too, are nicer because they have sparkles.

“Your feet are really big,” added her sister, who is 7. Her new slides have colorful flowers.

Then I visited my three youngest grandchildren — a boy, 7, and his twin siblings, a girl and a boy, almost 5 — who saw my new slides.

“They’re like dinosaur tracks,” remarked the 7-year-old, who wants to be a paleontologist when he grows up.

His little brother put on my slides and started clomping around the house.

“Are those yours?” I asked.

“Yes!” he said with a giggle.

“They’re about 12 sizes too big,” I estimated.

His twin sister looked at my plain black slides with the Nike logo and said, “Mine have rainbows.”

And that’s why my pudgy piggies cried OMG, all the way home!

Copyright 2024 by Jerry Zezima