Harriet's father's shoes

Today I realized I could no longer wear Harriet's father's shoes.

The heel on the right shoe is damaged so it feels like I'm falling off to the right as I walk. Listing, if you well, to starboard (or port, I'm not a sailor).

When Harriet's father died I got some great sweaters and this remarkable pair of shoes. They were what would once have been called 'chunka boots'--above the ankle and leather and wonderful shoes.

I just wore one of Harriet's father's sweaters the other day. But the shoes can't last any longer.

(Maybe I could take them to the last shoemaker I know of down in Hamden, just before the connector to 91 and get a new heel. Maybe....But who goes to a shoe repair shop anymore? Maybe I should do it just to support shoe repair as an endeavor and a livelihood. Just to show that liberal Democrats support small business in spite of all the nonsense I've heard from the clown show that passes as the Republican Presidential field.)

I don't remember when Harriet's father died. I have these issues with linear time that I've mentioned before. But I've worn his shoes for years and felt, each time I wore them, that I was, literally, 'walking in his moccasins' mile after mile. I even preached at his funeral but couldn't, if you held a gun to my head, tell you what year it was. Years and years ago.

I loved those shoes and loved them even more because they were Harriet's father's shoes.

I loved that a lot.

It's important to walk with the dead. It really is.

Ponder how you 'walk with the dead' from time to time....