Is there any woman who has not ever had a public fashion emergency? I happened to have mine, a major one, on my last and busiest day in my current job recently.
As any of us, I have occasionally had nightmares about stained shirts, torn dresses, and yes, every once in a while I thought about broken heels too, but I have always managed to dismiss the idea as swift as it came. This time though it not only stick in my head, but even became a reality.
Of course, what could be a better timing for your shoe to break than your last day at work when your every second is booked anyway?
Until well into the morning everything went great, I had everything planned, I even had plans for lunch, then teaching the new girl, then leaving everything as organized as ever, and then leaving for ever. I was just in the middle of some stuff, when my colleague called me that he had to leave for the train station, so he wouldn’t have the time to go to the bank, I should go for him. He asked me to meet him right away (so he wouldn’t be late), and then proceed with things. I said OK, replanned the next one or two hours and still thought I could make it according to the plan.
I was on my way, rushing to meet him, when I felt that the heel of one of my platform sandals slightly came off. At least at that time I thought it only came off slightly and it could be fixed easily. The only problem was I had no glue at hand (embarrassing as it is, chewing gum rushed through my mind as a possibility, too). The other problem was that I still had to rush, so I could not be careful and watch out so the whole wouldn’t come off. So, it did. Yes, it happened as simply, at one point the most part of one of my shoes remained while I kept running. Since we are talking about platform shoes, good thing I could keep my balance and didn’t fall flat on my face.
What I could do was pick up the shoe (basically the whole platform part) and keep running, tip-toeing on one of my feet, so it would seem (and feel) as if I still had both shoes on. I called my colleague to ask him to come a little closer so I wouldn’t have to run so far. He was kind enough to do so, gave me the money to take to the bank along with instructions, and acted as if he didn’t know it was my last day at work. Not that it’s important regarding this story, but he wished me a good weekend (even though it was possibly the last time we met), oh and good luck with my shoe. Which obviously I needed.
Why of course I had a plan. There is a very good shoemaker not far away from where it all happened (thank God, I thought), so I was heading there to ask whether there was some possibility to fix it with some emergency glue or something. Yeah, I wished!
I have to say before anything, that the two guys at the shoemaker’s were really kind, and it wasn’t their fault there wasn’t much to do, really. So I walked in there and said “I have a real emergency, my shoe is broken, and it is not possible for me to go on this way for long”, and asked whether there was any chance they can fix it immediately. They were really sympathetic, but said that one hour is the least that the glue needs to dry, if I wore them freshly glued, it would probably come off after one or two steps again.
“The other one will break too” one of them noted while inspecting my feet from behind the counter.
“Maybe that would be the best” I sighed, and decided to follow their advice to go and buy some cheap one at a nearby shoe shop, and then come back and leave the broken one to fix. So, they were kind enough to explain where I find the nearest shoe store and I went off once again, tip toeing on one of my feet with only the frame of the shoe on. It turned out the nearest shoe store was one tram stop away, and you are not going to believe my luck, but yep, it was closed! I couldn’t believe it myself, I looked around quickly and spotted one fashion store on the opposite side of the street, where I remembered they had shoes, so I went accross, and looked around.
Normally, I don’t really like that store, they don’t ever have the kind of stuff I like, especially in shoes, but given that it wasn’t really the right time and occasion for shoe shopping, it only took a few minutes to look through the very poor selection and pick the best one, which I swear is the ugliest pair of shoes I have ever had. Fortunately, it didn’t cost too much, so after paying, I changed immediately, and rushed back to the shoemaker in my new shoes.
He was really funny, even bent over from behind the counter to inspect my new shoes before he took the other pair. And once again, he was really kind and helpful, told me he would examine the other one too, and fasten both to make sure this wouldn’t happen again.
So then I could go on to the exchange office and then to the bank and then to the post office in my ugly new shoes, which even were uncomfortable to walk in, but I didn’t really care at that point. When I finished everything, and ran all the errands I had to, it was almost time to get back to the office to teach the new girl. Since the whole running around took about half an hour (it felt a lot more), I didn’t mind not having time for lunch, but I did mind that I lost a lot of time of my perfectly planned schedule. From then on the whole afternoon was sort of a hurry-scurry. But I still think I left things organized and operable.
About the shoe emergency, I have to say, it is a lot more scary to think about it, than to actually be in a situation like this. Running around on half tip-toes, I only felt ridiculous. I couldn’t really pay attention whether people were looking or noticing (that’s the worst part of the nightmare, right?), I swear I could even laugh at myself (or smile at least). I also kept thinking how my friends will be laughing when I tell this story (they were).
And moreover, now that the worst fashion nightmare already happened to me, what worse could come?
(photo courtesy of Gattobravo Miao)
