The Gentle Patter of Summer Sandals

We appear to have had enough warm days in a row that I've dared to undertake a mid year ritual prematurely. That's right; screw Memorial Day. It's time to trot out my summer clothes and my summer sandals from their dank grave in the storage unit of my apartment building and store the sweaters, coats and boots until winter rears its gnarled gray cape again.

This task is no small feat. Being an urban apartment dweller means navigating an unwieldy building luggage cart (the same kind you'd see at a hotel) into an unaccommodating elevator and then through the narrow hallways of my apartment. I piled the cart with a large box of winter footwear, lovingly wrapped in bags for their summer sleep. I gently stroked my black suede boots before resigning them into a storage box. Into a large cardboard box strewn with a few cedar wood squares to stave off the moths went my sweaters and wool jackets and suede coats. Good bye, old friends. Fare thee well.

I steered this unsteady and full cart down the building hallways, physically throwing myself against it order to turn the wheels to wedge it into the elevator so the doors could shut. The storage unit in the basement is dark and musty and menacing. Often you see the scuttling of some kind of critter across your path as you switch on the lights at the entrance. The storage units, which cost practically another mortgage (storage space being such a dear commodity in Manhattan) are reasonably ample and clean. Stacking your possessions in one of these units is like compiling a Chinese puzzle. The key is to use all available space and in this regard, I have used the space effectively. In order to get to my box of slumbering sandals and a wardrobe box with my summer clothing, I had to pull out a portion of items blocking the way: some framed art of pears, part of a glass coffee table, some faux Eames chairs without the legs and a very cool chrome garbage can which unfortunately doesn't fit in my kitchen anywhere.

Finally, I located the box of shoes and the entry flap of the garment box. Atop the box balanced a 1930s wing back and walnut chair that I bought in a second hand shop in 1989 with my tax refund. I drag it everywhere with me, despite its obvious need to be reupholstered, because I am deeply fond of it. Once I located the wardrobe box, I began to extract with surgical precision a bounty of summer clothing: soft silky summer frocks and cotton skirts and colorful blouses. Seeing the light colors and delicate material raised my spirits, anticipating the hot days ahead. When I found my white eyelet skirt from last season, I squealed. In delight. Eyelet is still in.

I packed the luggage cart with my next season largess and loaded the ebbing season accoutrements into their secluded storage, before jigsawing the floating storage unit contents back into their place. I balanced the cart once again through the hallways, into the elevator and back into my apartment. I felt guilty for monopolizing the cart for nearly 30 minutes, so I chucked the clothing and shoes onto the guestroom bed and whipped the cart around to return it to the lobby. At that very moment, the box of summer footwear upturned, sending a pile of shoes onto the floor. It landed in quite a picturesque tableau so I decided to document it (above).

Looking at the picture now, I am a little mortified to see that I have so many pairs of shoes when it's obvious I have such little room to store it. There are people in third world countries that are lucky to even have a pair of shoes. Some people never have the luxury of swapping out their footwear each season because they live in a tundra year long and they're not able to expose any part of their skin to the sun. Some people don't even have shoes and wear plastic bags trussed around their legs like polyurethane Uggs.

These deep thoughts were suddenly replaced with something even more urgent. Shit, I need to get a pedicure if I'm committing to summer wear. A girl must prioritize, after all.