For the past week, every morning when I walk Betty, I see my neighbour, Chuck, raking up mountains of dead leaves on his front lawn.  It’s July for Godsake!  “I don’t what’s happening, the tree isn’t dead but it keeps dropping leaves and making new ones.  Pain in the ass,” he says.  It’s a perpetual autumn tree and when I walk b y his house, I keep thinking it’s fall.  Sometimes I am confused in the morning.  I despise the idea of change, a Pavlovian reaction to having to go back to school in September after having the best summers in the world.  But when it does come and it will again, and I am in it, I am my best self.  I am my best self because a little nip in the air causes me to study my wardrobe and get excited about accessorizing.  It may be a frivoulous diversion to some but I believe when you look good, you feel good.  And when you feel good, the world is your scratching post.

But the last few years, my mojo has been compromised.   As y’all know, I have made many attempts to jump-start it.  I have belly-danced, hula-hooped, vibrated every orifice, and even taken a naked spin class, and blah, nothing really got me going.   One summer, 5 years ago, when I broke my toes on my right foot, I wore pink Crocs, all through September and in October, I switched to Uggs. That, most likely, was the year I disappeared. I lost my power.  The mojo that I had honed and was my glory had turned into my demise.  It was my Achilles heel!  Comfortable shoes from now on!

The other day, Evangeline and I were doing the Queen Street East strip in search of old style non-pocket photo albums for her current obsession with Lomography (future post).  She has my shopping gene, where when you want something bad, you hunt it down and comb every possible store, until you get it.  In my day, there was no eBay or Amazon, and once I made my parents take me all the way to Vermont to find a book which we did and then had Ben & Jerry’s ice cream in the flagship store.  The best part of the hunt are the little retail diversion discoveries along the way:  Did you know the old linen store beside Bark & Fitz is now a store for that sells custom corsets and tulle petticoats?   I know this is what every husband of a stroller-pushing, dogwalking beach mom wants his wife to be wearing.  Or his mistress, what am I talking about?

Our retail diversion was the very cool store, Yoka, 2116 Queen Street East.  There’s always stuff to want in there and the staff is so cool and friendly.  But because of my dormant mojo and budget restraints, I have not been there in a while.  But there was a nip in the air.  And all the chokras were buzzing.  I zoomed passed the racks of possiblities and my eyes hit the shoe display.  And there was the boot.  Without even thinking or hestitating, I grabbed it and whoa, it was heavy. I am sure  they cleverly filled the display boot with marbles so you wouldn’t think of licking it like a fudgsicle.  Of course that was my instinct.  I’ve got love, lust, and hunger all mixed up, see previous post.  The boots also look like swirls of chocolate and caramel in the shape of Superwoman.  They are made by Tsubo, a running shoe manufacturer, and the salesgirl said as if she needed sell them, “They’re really comfortable.”  Blah, blah, comfort shmomfort, there is no way I’m leaving this store without a pair.  And for me, with my pampered Birkenstock-wearing monkey toes, to say that meant that this was love.  Or lust.  Or hunger.

And they had my size, certainly another reason to celebrate this store.  The owner is Dutch and Zero is a chocolate bar, not a size.  I warned the salesgirl, “These most likely will not fit over my Herculean calves.”

“They will,” she said, “There’s a cobbler on the Danforth who can fix anything!”

Oh great, all I need is a cobbler crush.  I’ve got a bathroom that needs to be gutted.  Note to self:  Buy boots, wear short skirt, and hang out at Rona.

Anyway, the boots went on, and with manoevring, zipped all the way up.  I have been wearing them for two days straight.  Lunging, squatting, vacuuming, walking the dog.  It’s not fall yet, but this broad has it going on.  And until autumn comes, I will leave your with this: