Let your dreams outgrow the shoes of your expectations.
Ryunosuke Satoro

One of my favorite childhood memories is about getting new shoes….play shoes! My favorite play shoes from the time I was three years old until about seven or eight years old, were PF Flyers. I LOVED my play shoes; and I especially loved when they were new. I loved how they smelled out of the box: a little rubbery, a little like starched canvas. I would spend a great deal of time inspecting my shoes at home. I would run my fingers over the clean, bumpy, gum soles and I would press my pudgy finger tips into the bright, squishy insoles…insoles strewn with fanciful graphics and words I could not read.

Deb in her shoes ca. 1965

I remember being intrigued by the rectangular box on the heel of each shoe. Each box so beautifully bright and blue atop the contrasting white, wrap-around rubber. But most of all, the favorite part of my new shoes were their unscuffed white toe-caps, which of course, I thought made them look so very strong and keen, ready for fun. For many days after receiving my new shoes, I would line them up on the floor of my closet next to my old play shoes. Then I would notice the stark contrast between the two sets.

I would think about all the days of playing I had done wearing my old shoes; no wonder they looked so tired and shabby. How many days of play would it take, I wondered, before my new shoes resembled my old shoes. I pondered whether it was possible to keep my new shoes forever new, and then a sad thought appeared. I realized the only way to keep my new shoes new, would be for me not to wear them for play. That was an unbearable thought, because new shoes are meant to be worn and played in! And so at a tender age I learned a helpful lesson from my little red shoes: everything new eventually grows old, but adventure, real or imagined, may always be had simply by lacing on a new pair of shoes.

My current collection for play