There was a minor incident recently concerning a child on my caseload who went to school without any shoes on for a variety of bizarre reasons. Bottom line… no one was hurt and his houseparents know now to look down at his feet before he leaves the house.
My reaction to this incident could be considered by some to be way out of proportion to the problem But those people never knew my Uncle Joe and his foot fetish. In his world, no one went without shoes – ever. You either had shoes on or slippers on but what you didn’t have was feet showing. And no, socks did not count.
To this day I have no idea why this issue made him so crazy. To the best of my knowledge, none of his siblings went bezerk at the sight of unshod feet. All I know is that any child that ran by where he was sitting who did not have proper foot attire on was immediately and forcefully stopped by his bellow… I mean, call… to suggest that if we wanted to remain alive long enough to get to the next day, we should go find appropriate footwear.
There was not a son, daughter, niece, nephew or grandchild that was not aware of this issue within the first few months of hauling themselves upright and walking.
So that’s my excuse for coming unglued at the recent shoeless incident. It wasn’t my voice and it wasn’t my words coming out of my mouth. I was merely channeling one of the biggest influences in my life as he guided me to the proper and respectful path for feet.