This is a Shoe Saga

A few days ago, I was standing in my closet and realized that I officially do not own a pair of black high heels. How could this have happened? Doesn't every woman need some basic, black pumps? The thing is, I vaguely remember doing a closet purge about a year ago and my black heels were sooooo sad looking and the leather was tearing off and the heels were worn and I remember deciding that they looked too awful to wear so I tossed them and thought "I'll buy a new pair the next time I have an event that requires high heels."

Sadly, it's time to admit that I don't go anywhere anymore that is fancy. I don't wear heels anymore. Sometimes I wear heeled boots. And sometimes I wear a cute dress with flats. But I just don't go fancy places anymore. This is my life. The wedding season of my life has mostly ended. There were a few years there that we were literally invited to 8 weddings per summer, but that has died down and now we are in the never ending season of baby showers. And I can wear some cute flats to a baby shower. I used to wear heels to work almost everyday. Not so much anymore. My cowboy boots are the highest heel I get these days.

Today, while Ellie was at school, I decided to shoe shop for some black heels to wear on a date with my man this weekend. This search was a bit more in depth than I originally anticipated.

Stores I looked in:
Nine West
Aldo
Macy's
Dillards
Famous Footwear
Payless
Marshalls
Ross
DSW
Another Marshalls
Another DSW

I spent my whole morning driving all over kingdom come. It's a black pump, y'all. A BLACK HIGH HEEL. Could there be anything more generic and common?

I kept running into the same problems over and over again:

Problem #1: The shoes cost a million dollars. Okay, not a million, but close enough. I was not looking to spend hundreds of dollars. I was looking to spend tens of dollars. Oh, look! This shoe would be perfect! Oh, look! It's three hundred dollars.

Problem #2: Heel height. Look, I know the higher the shoes, the longer your legs look but a) I greatly value comfort and b) my husband isn't all that tall and so if I wear sky high heels then we look a bit like Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise. I don't want one inch heels, but why is the next option 6 inches? WHY?

Problem #3: Sizing. Sigh. We've talked about this before. I wear a size 5 shoe. Yes, a 5. I know. I know it's small. Sadly, most shoe designers don't make their shoes in a 5. Most start at a size 6. And the ones that DO make their shoes in a 5 only make about 3 pairs of that size to go around the whole country. I can not tell you how many times I have found the perfect shoe and then I am told that it doesn't come in my size, or that it's sold out in my size.

WHY DO YOU HATE ON THE LITTLE PEOPLE, SHOE COMPANIES?!

Often times, when I can't find a 5, I will go to the children's section and find a little girl shoe in a size 3 (it's the same thing) but unfortunately that plan works better with flats rather than heels. There isn't a big demand for black pumps in a children's shoe store.

At the first DSW I found a shoe that they actually had in a 5.5 and it felt super snug and so I tried it on in a 6 and it felt fantastic. Hooray! I can wear a 6! Sadly, they only had the 6 in Beige and so I had to drive across town to another DSW and I bought the shoe and then I rewarded my diligence with waffle fries and a Diet Coke. I was exhausted.

Has this been the most boring blog post you've ever read in your whole entire life? My apologies. I just have some feelings about the shoes.

Anyways, here they are, Calvin Klein's in a size 6 from DSW:

See? Why was that so hard? Why did that have to be so difficult? There's nothing overly exciting about them or unique. For the love.