AnonymousCoworker

Most of the time when I blog about something, it’s because I’m reminded of that event, or inspired by that thought, by something I read on YOUR site. In this case, my muse is the Pink Lemonade Diva.

Ever since the end of the 11th grade, I’ve gone out of my way to wear shoes that didn’t have laces. Prior to the 11th I wore Black or Red Converse Chuck Taylors (and I wore the black ones when I was pole vaulting), and I had dress shoes for school.

My parents gave me a pair of wool clogs for Christmas, and they were the most comfortable shoes I’ve ever owned. They were great! Unfortunately, my pinky toe on my right foot kicks out a little bit, so after about 2 years I had worn a hole through the right side of the right clog. Boo.

Meanwhile, I had removed the laces to the shoes that I wore to high school. My high school had a dress code, and everyday we were required to wear a button down shirt, tie, slacks/dress pants, a belt, and dress shoes. All out buttons had to be buttoned, and our shirt always had to be tucked in. This wasn’t a loosey-goosey dress code policy like other schools may have had. This was serious business. You could get detention for the top button of your shirt being undone before the end of the school day.

Anyway, back to the laces. The dean of students (the one who gave me 5 days detention for the fire extinguisher thing) noticed (about a week after the fire extinguisher thing, now that I think about it) that I had no laces in my shoes after I had gotten my senior year picture taken.

“What’s wrong with your shoes?”

I looked down in an obvious attempt to become surprised at the lack of shoelaces, but I couldn’t muster it, “Nothing.”

“Where are your shoelaces?”

“I took them out.”

“Put them back in.”

“I don’t have them, I threw them away.”

“Come with me.”

We walked back to his office, and he sat down behind his desk.

“We have a very specific dress code.”

“I’m aware of that,” he had no idea how aware I was.

“So you’re blatantly disobeying the rules.”

“No sir.”

“Well then would you mind giving me an explanation for your behavior?”

“There is no mention of shoelaces in the dress code.”

“What?”

“The dress code only says that we have to wear brown or black dress shoes, it doesn’t say anything about shoelaces.”

He grabbed the dress code off the wall from behind his chair. His beady, too-close-together, wrestler eyes ran over the words on the paper.

“Well I don’t care what the dress code says. You’ll have laces in those shoes tomorrow.”

I left his office, and I never put the laces in my shoes. He knew he couldn’t do anything, and the next year the policy was changed to indicate that all shoes that required laces would have laces, and that the laces would be tied at all times.

Now I wear grey, leather clogs to work, or a pair of shiny black loafers, with no laces. I have a pair of brown shoes with laces, but they’ll need to be replaced soon. I’m not sure why, but I just don’t like the laces.