ArcaMax

For all the obsessing I've done about my body parts, the one area that has always escaped the harsh glare of my overcritical eye is my feet. Certainly they are not perfect feet, and Manolo Blahnik would never beat down my door to have me model his shoes. But as feet go, they are fairly unassuming; I would even go so far as to say cute. I certainly have the best feet in my family and, having seen pictures of celebrity feet, I can honestly say I actually have nicer feet than some Hollywood starlets. On the downside, they are half a size bigger than they were before I had kids. However, they are the ONLY part of me that's not a full size bigger than before I had kids, so for that, I am grateful to them.

So, with all that good foot karma going on, it came as something of a shock to me when someone had the audacity to say something unflattering about my terrific tootsies.

"You have very, very flat feet," said the podiatrist. "That's why your feet hurt. You have no arch support."

I wiggled my pretty painted red toes, pedicured to perfection just for this visit to the foot doctor. "They don't look flat to me," I protested.

She picked up a plastic model of a foot that was on the counter nearby and held it next to my foot. Her dummy foot had an arch. My real foot did not.

"You need orthotics. And these," she said, holding up my flip-flops, "are going in the garbage."

I gasped. No flip-flops? It was unthinkable. I loved flip-flops. I lived in flip-flops. I wore nothing but flip-flops from the first day of spring until the last day of fall. I had an entire shoe rack of color-coded flip-flops to go with every conceivable clothing combination. I even had high-heeled flip-flops. All hail the Queen of Flip-Flops.

"Maybe if I just got a good foot massage or some reflexology, they'd feel better," I offered.

She shook her head, took my hand, looked me square in the eye and said, "You need orthotics, and you need a shoe that can hold an orthotic. Your flip-flop days are over. I'm sorry."

As she left the room to get my orthotic mold, I glanced around and suddenly noticed a rack in the back filled with orthopedic shoes. I looked from my cute little flip-flops to these big clunky clodhoppers and realized my footwear options were about to take a very unattractive turn.

Now, clearly with the aforementioned love of flip-flops, it's no surprise that I've never won any awards for my choice of footwear. I tend toward a more eclectic collection than your everyday heels, boots and sneakers. I have camouflage-colored clogs and black patent leather cowboy boots. My favorite sneakers are neon orange with green laces. High fashion, they're not. But I love all my weird shoes, and even though my flat feet were killing me, I wasn't willing to give up my shoes for a closet full of clodhoppers.

That night I told my husband my tale of woe.

"I have flat feet," I said

"I have flat feet too," he echoed.

"The doctor says I have to wear orthotics."

"I wear orthotics too," he said

"And I'll have to wear clodhoppers."

"You don't have to wear clodhoppers," he assured me.

"Really?"

"Really."

"Now I know why I married you," I told him.

"Because I'm a nice guy?"

"No," I said. "Because we're sole mates!"

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Tracy Beckerman is the author of the Amazon Bestseller, "Barking at the Moon: A Story of Life, Love, and Kibble," available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble online! You can visit her at www.tracybeckerman.com.

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