Every family hands something down. A recipe. A temper. A way of folding towels that you swear is the only correct way.
Mine handed down a sentence about shoes.
You and I have been getting dressed together for a few weeks now, one piece at a time. If you’re new here though, let me introduce you to Helen, my great-grandmother. She ran the post office out of her living room in Pennsylvania almost 100 years ago. She brought up a wooden counter where her living room once was. She had a stamp drawer with her own stamper dipped in dried ink.
There was a small brass bell that rang when the front door opened. Her family knew the morning by the sound of her boots on the wood floor. That soft click of a heel. I imagine her back in 1930 being a woman moving through her own house like she had somewhere to be. She gave herself every chance to.
Her phrase came down through the women in my family. Helen to my grandmother, to my mother, to me.
Get up and put on your shoes. By the time it reached me it was a hum. A small ritual you set in motion before the day gets a chance to set you in motion instead.
Getting up and putting on your shoes was more than a rule or ritual. It was a right. And Helen paved the way.
(If you’re new here, read Start Here and The Practice first. That’s the front door.)
PUT ON your shoes tomorrow before you do anything else. Before the phone. Before the news. That sound on the floor is Helen, still going.
