Summer is fading like my tan and I’m so grateful I may go to church and light a candle.
OK, maybe not. But I am eternally grateful to God that autumn is blowing in soon on a chilly wind.
Why? Because people no longer will be wearing flip-flops as the temps dip. I’m simply sick of seeing people’s toes. They turn me green with envy.
Now don’t get the wrong impression. I don’t have a foot fetish. I have Cavus feet, which in plain English means I have abnormally high arches.
My arches are almost as high as the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. It’s the highest arch in the world, checking in at 630 feet tall. Sadly, my arches are only a few inches shorter. You could stack a whole convoy of tractor trailers on top of one another and fit them comfortably under my arches.
Once I was walking barefoot in the yard when a groundhog ran under my arches. I wouldn’t have even noticed if my wife hadn’t screamed like a banshee in terror.
As you can imagine, getting comfortable shoes with Cavus is even harder than toting a refrigerator on your back up to the Pagoda. Which is my I wear sneakers even when I’m wearing a suit.
Cavus is a deformity that afflicts only an estimated 20 percent of the population. Call us the Cursed Twenty Percenters. Cavus not only leads to other deformities but also puts you in a higher tax bracket.
High arches beget hammer toes, which feature a bent middle joint. My toe middle joints are more jackknifed than a tractor trailer toppling off a bypass off ramp in an ice storm. Indeed, my toes look like they were worked over with a tire iron. A dozen tire irons.
High arches beget claw toes, which feature toes that curl downward and dig into the soles of shoes, or in my case, sneakers. Claw toes negatively impact the way you walk because they raise havoc with your balance. No balance beam for me. Claw toes can even unbalance your checkbook. Just ask my accountant.
Needless to say, with my hammer and claw toes nobody calls me Twinkle Toes. At least I have that going for me.
High arches beget ankle instability. I’ve sprained my ankles numerous times over the years and broken my left one twice.
My left foot is, to be kind, malformed. If somebody is boring me at a cocktail party, I simply remove the sneaker and sock from my left foot and stick it in the punch bowl. The person putting me to sleep immediately flees, howling all the way.
High arches beget metatarsal fractures. I experienced one of those and was in a walking boot for 12 weeks. Several years later I had to have one of my metatarsal knuckles surgically removed. Both experiences were such mirthful experiences it’s a wonder my toes didn’t curl up in delight.
With Cavus and the hammer and claw toes that come with it, it’s a daunting challenge to trim toenails. Indeed, you must be part acrobat and part neurosurgeon. It’s also tough to cut what you can’t see because your toes are so curled under. Perhaps I should try sonar.
Decades ago before I was married, an attractive young lady found me to be rather aesthetically appealing one night in a bar. Alas, it was summertime. And I was wearing flip-flops because I was young and dumb.
As fate would have it, she glanced down, saw my grotesque toes impersonating curly fries and gave me a withering look of disgust. At that moment I saw Cupid putting his arrow back into his quiver.
One other tale of woe emanating from my youthful stupidity. I walked wearing flip-flops into a Piggly Wiggly supermarket while on vacation down south and one of the clerks immediately stuck a For Sale label on my toes.
Upon further reflection, I will go to church and light that candle after all. And pray for fallen arches. If that miracle would occur, I’d become a cop walking a beat just for the thrill of somebody calling me a flatfoot.
Mike Zielinski, a resident of Berks County, is a columnist, novelist, playwright and screenwriter.
