I’ve been wearing these most unusual shoes with springs in the heels, to help me recover from a heel spur. They look a tad like high-heeled athletic shoes and my hubby calls them my “Frankenstein shoes.”

Z-Coil athletic shoes

I think they’re great, nonetheless. I have only one complaint: they pick up pebbles. The soles are grooved for traction and they seem to be a precise fit for the round pebbles in our driveway. I’ve carried so many little rocks into the house, before long we’re going to be compelled to order another truckload for outdoors.

When I walk across the floor, my pebbled sole makes a clicking sound. If I’m on a smooth surface, my foot slides. “Wait! I have a pebble in my shoe,” has become the word of the day—so much so, Daniel has suggested I write about it for Short Takes on Life.

What a cliché, I’m thinking. But maybe he has a new “take” on it, so I asked.

“Oh, it makes you limp; it’s hidden; it’s unwanted. You know.”

No, I did not know. Every life metaphor I could think of has been done and overdone. It’s like, “Walk a mile in my moccasins” or “A penny saved is a penny earned.” I don’t want to write about tired subjects! (Honestly, I don’t even want to think about them.)

Then I remembered a young man at the grocery store who didn’t know what oleo was, and my daughter who didn’t know her dad meant to encourage her when he said she was like the Ugly Duckling. There is a new generation coming on; perhaps they don’t know about the pebble in the shoe metaphor.

Edgar Allen Poe is falsely attributed as having written, “The past is a pebble in my shoe.” Whoever first said or wrote it was referring to living with a tiny annoyance in your life. These things from the past have to be dealt with or they can turn into grievous sores.

This little truism has been turned into poetry, song lyrics, book titles and more. It’s universal!

My pebbles are on the outside of my shoe. Does the metaphor still fit? Or should we revert to “a stitch in time saves nine” because I’m preventing an embarrassing and painful fall by promptly removing my pebbles?

I think my take on this incident is that we each one see life through our own filter. The resultant diversity is incredibly wonderful, as long as we stay aware of it. We cannot possibly ask another person to see things exactly as we do.

My husband sees my odd shoes as a hindrance; I see them as a help, although I do hope my need is temporary. Pebbles? Eh, a minor annoyance.