A Tale of Two Converse

For Easter my sister bought me a pair of white, Converse low-tops and a box of jelly bellies. Your inner monologue-voice is probably remarking something along the lines of "shoes? for easter? why not." But if you allow me to escort you back a few weeks, you will realize that white Converse low-tops are a brilliant gift.

Two and a half weeks ago I discovered that I was missing a shoe. A white, Converse low-top (keep reading! I promise that this blog will be more interesting than a brief story about replacing a pair of shoes). I wasn't terribly worried, as I lose and then find things all the time. I am not very organized. The Lost Shoe never came to light and I mourned it as a lost friend, because it had come to me via two friends of mine. My junior year I lived with two girls, J. and M. (and C. as well, but only for a quarter and while I like her lots she isn't necessary to this story). M.'s mother had bought the shoes for her because she needed white shoes for Jew Camp (I don't remember why). She then decided that she couldn't pull them off and gave them to J. J. wore them for a while and then decided that she didn't want them anymore and gave them to me. They were already broken in and a perfect shade of dirty white and had some hearts and stars that M. had drawn on them when she was a teenager. Plus, they were free! I didn't wear the shoes that often for the next few years, then I grew to love them and it was a stable, supportive relationship that was based on friendship that grew into love. They comforted and supported my feet (and were free!) and I made them look really cool by wearing high-end fashion. Ok, not really. Most of my jeans are frayed somewhere or have holes, but that's what you wear with beat up Chuck Taylors. Anyways, they were never found. KT and I think that they were thrown into the pile of shoes that lives in between an armchair and a stack of newspapers intended for the recycling, and was accidentaly gathered up and tossed into the bin. Or martians stole it. One or the other.
Which is why a complete pair of white, Converse low-tops were a great gift.

Your inner monologue-voice is probably saying to you right now "that's nice Em, too bad about your shoe, but why should I care?" Because that is the SECOND converse low-top that I have lost in Europe.

I was in France seven years ago for a five week language trip. We stopped at the Gorges du Tarne to regroup after our homestays. We went spelunking (cave exploring) in two groups. I was in the first group and the next group went the day after mine did. The cave was cold and wet and we came out caked in red clay. They had outfitted us with jumpsuits and helmets (with flames at the front, not battery operated flashlights, which was a mistake because someone accidently burned the helper-guide as he helped her up an incline.) So no ones clothes suffered, just our shoes. So, I lent my maroon converse to a girl in the second group because she didn't want to get her white shoes mucky. After they went spelunking we met them and went canoing down a river (that had mild rapids! wheee!). She took the shoes off and was rinsing them in the water when her boat tipped over and she lost hold of one. So, there's a maroon Converse shoe swirling around the waterways of France that once belonged to me.

I just had an image of myself traveling across Europe and liberally sprinkling it with converse low-tops.