The day my shoes died...

My Bible camp growing up, has been breaking out the old pictures. This was me and my friend Lee, who was in my youth group and eventually went on the be the Senior Pastor of my brother's church in BC.

But the reason I'm sharing this picture (besides the fact that I'm skinny and have hair), are those shoes and socks I'm wearing. The old leather shoes and slouched wool work socks combo.

I loved that style. As evdenced by the fact that I'm wearing them by the pool at a Bible camp in summer. But this picture made me think of the night that style died for me.

I took this combo with me to Bolivia a few short months after this picture was taken. I used to sit in the guys' dorm at the home in the evening and just hang out. I didn't speak much Spanish but we'd still laugh and joke around.

Those shoes were of a style, where the leather looked more...worn and rustic shall we say. That did not sit well in a room full of ex-shoe shiner street kids.

One night a shoe shine box showed up. Every street kid in those days had one. A little wooden box to carry their supplies in. A box they could sit on and put your shoe against while they shined it.

Immediately the competition began. There was a show involved in shoe shining. The snap of the cloth! The buffing of the shoe! It was all important and I soon had a crowd around me, intent on demonstrating who was the best shoe shiner of the crew.

I watched with a sinking heart as my once cool and trendy leather shoes attained a shine that my pastor/missionary grandfather would have been proud of. Those shoes ended up with a gleam that would blind you in the Bolivian noon-day sun.

The boys were thrilled and those shoes never lacked a glisten as long as I owned them.

As for the socks, I never managed to explain the style of slouched socks to them. To a bunch of soccer playing Bolivians, socks should be pulled up to your knees at the very least. I eventually got tired of pushing my socks back down after 80 boys pulled them up for me every night. Plus, with my shiny shoes, the whole look just wasn't coming together anymore.

And...that's the story of my Canadian shoes and sock slamming into Bolivia street kid culture