But every week or so, I get a small snapshot of what that collection family photo would look like. It started when I was in high school. My uncle Jerome advised me that I should try not to wear the same pair of shoes in consecutive days -I should let them air out first. By keeping a nice rotation, I could extend the life of the shoes, keep each pair from stinking up too fast -just generally maintain all-around freshness.
As my shoe collection grew, the lineups in the hall grew. Days would pass and I would rotate between the pairs in the hallway and other pairs in my room, but every pair I wore eventually ended up in the hallway to air out. I would sometimes try to see how long I could stretch the line before my mom would get mad. The first complaint generally came around five pairs. The second came around eight. Anything past ten or twelve and it was final warning. Either that, or she would throw all my shoes into my room just to clean the hall. When the sneakers fill up the hallway to the point that I start stumbling on them on my way to the bathroom and kitchen, I know it's shoe cleaning day.
up the hall..
down the hall..
Today, my first shoe cleaning day of autumn, I took a look down from the end of the hallway and thought, "Man, there is a lot of heat(1) in this out here." Not to brag. Not at all. But any sneaker collector can admire a nice shoe when they see one and the hallway was my collection's mini-masterpiece. The variety reminded me of a time in high school. I decided that for the whole month, I would go through my entire collection (around twenty-something pairs at the time), a new pair every day, no repeats until the whole thing was done. Then I got to thinking, what if I tried that now?
I like to save the nicer shoes for things like date night, going out, birthday parties, church, etc. you get the picture... but if I filled in the work and bad weather days with beaters(2), I think this is something I could actually do. I've been wanting to do this for a few years, but now that my collection has begun to plateau, I think it'd be fun to dig into the depths of the stacks and see what I actually have.
sorting..
stacking..
I'll try to document everything on here as I go, along with some (hopefully) interesting stories about the shoes themselves or whatever they've inspired me to write about. Anyone that sees me can keep the blog honest by checking and making sure I haven't doubled up. I probably won't be able to do one-hundred shoes in exactly one-hundred days, but hopefully I'll be able to get through the collection by New Years. I'm actually more excited now that I'm writing about it than I was when I was thinking about the project earlier. Hopefully by the end, even if I don't have the family photo, I can piece it all together. Day one starts Sunday! I wonder what I'm going to wear....?
{currently in the speakers: A Tribe Called Quest - Can I Kick It?}
...(see what I did there?)
(1) Heat: n. - an expensive, rare or "hot" sneaker.
(2) Beaters: n. - the "every day" shoes that you don't mind getting messed up. a beat up pair of shoes.
*September 11th... we will never forget.*
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