Shoes and Sandals

I took the boys to the mall one evening last week to buy them shoes and sandals. At the first store, Kids Foot Locker, Turner disappeared twice, within the store, so I carried him around on my hip while trying to get Jesse fitted with shoes. Inevitably I had to put Turner down, at which point he immediately grabbed two display shoes and dashed out the door. Sigh. I just can’t keep up with him. Literally. I count on pedestrians to get in his way. Fortunately, he’s not very good at scoping out the path in front of him – he’s too busy looking over his shoulder giggling at me.

We picked out a pair of shoes for Turner at the second store, and in an effort to keep him occupied while I gathered our things I handed him the shoebox and told him to take it to the register so we could pay for it. I hope he just wasn’t listening, because he took the shoebox and hoofed it straight out the door. Sigh.

But that’s neither here nor there. I did not really intend to talk about my nascent shoplifter. Jesse, it turns out, had to have running shoes. Not athletic shoes. He specifically requested “running shoes,” and he really did mean the shoes underneath the sign that says, “Running.” He is now the proud owner of a pair of Nike running shoes that are better than any Randy has ever owned. I must have asked Jesse a dozen different ways how this idea came to be in his head, without getting any useful information out of him. But on the way out, passing the hair salon, he asked to get his hair cut. What? He’s seven. Whence comes this emphasis on appearance? Is this what comes of living in McLean? Or were the shoes really about trying to improve his performance?

I’m hoping it was the latter. Jesse wore the shoes home from the store, and he was definitely showing Turner what he knew about the sport of leaving Mom in the dust.

We never did get to the sandals.