Barefootin'

There comes a time, after the snow melts and also after a few weeks of anti-fungal treatment because you forgot to wear your flip flops in the shower at the RV park, for your feet to make their summer debut.  Most women delight in sandal season and kick it off with an industrial strength pedicure and a coat of bright polish.  But, I'm not most women.

I hate spa treatments, including mani-pedis.  Among the many reasons for this is that I don't want to pay for women to gossip about how gross my feet are in Korean.  Not to stereotype or anything, but in my vast pedicure experience, three times, I've had a pedicure, they've all been Korean.  Wait, I think I've only gone twice.  Anyway, obviously I have a huge pool of data to draw from.  And no one should see my feet that close up.  Even with a mask on after my feet have been soaked in disinfectant.  What kind of psycho wants to be a nail technician?  Or a dental hygienist?  They are two of the grossest jobs.  I'm personally doing my best to make the job go extinct, by reducing demand, but so far it's not working.

It's not that I don't take care of my feet.  I clip my nails regularly.  Well, when I finally locate the nail clippers.  They're usually in my sons' shower.  Which helps explain the 20 minute showers they take.  Then, I use a PedEgg a few times a year to cheese grate off the thick callouses.   And I push back my cuticles annually, whether they need it or not.  So, it's a very strict regimen, obviously.

After all the obligatory maintenance is complete, that's when I go full-on glamming them up.  Not because I want to, but because with age, toenails get thicker, yellow and deep ridges appear.  Even without my distance glasses on, I'm repulsed when I look down at my own toenails.  Never mind when I sit down, pull my feet in and inspect them close up with my reading glasses on.  It's akin to looking at your face with a magnifying mirror.  Which only an esthetician should do.  Which is the third grossest job.  Extracting blackheads and popping other people's zits, really?  Anyway, this is the part where I paint my nails a gorgeous extremely pale pink that makes it look like I don't have polish on at all.  And even with my reading glasses I manage to glob it up and I will have to remove it and do it at least three times.  The third attempt is marginally better than the first, but by then I've just given up.  Plus, all my friends are middle-aged too and can't see my feet clearly from 5 or 6 feet away either.  So,  it really doesn't matter anyway.

Then, it's time for the big reveal.  So I slide into my flip flops with the arch support because I traded in the cheap Old Navy ones for a more comfortable, stable and orthopedic-friendly version years ago.   And that's when I douse my feet in sunscreen.  Even then, after reapplying several times throughout the day, I'll still have a tan line from the straps of my practical flip flops all summer long.  Which will be the least hideous thing about you seeing my bare feet.

 Do not make direct eye contact with my feet. 

 You've been warned.