Beech Tree News Network

I have ten extra pairs of shoes…I counted.  I’m not talking about my personal shoes, like church shoes, tennis shoes, sandals and flats.  I’m talking about extra pairs of shoes in various sizes.  Some of these shoes have been worn by me or Garey or one of my daughters.  I’ve also picked up a few cheap pairs at yard sales.  I keep them for emergencies.  Not the kind of emergencies like the house is on fire, and I’ve got to jump into a pair on my way out or someone shows up at my door, wearing no shoes, although the extras would work in either of those situations.  The emergencies I speak of usually have to do with my granddaughter’s friends.  The friends who show up in their brand-new school shoes, their moms have just paid seventy-five dollars for, and they want to ride the 4-wheeler through the mud.  Those shoes.  I can usually find shoes that will work for those activities.  

Occasionally, I will see a pair of shoes at a yard sale that will fit Garey.  I recently got a pair of those canvas Sketchers for fifty cents.  Garey loves them and wears them walking and gardening.  They have held up really well except for the small hole in the toe of the right shoe, caused by an unfortunate miscalculation on Garey’s part, while he was trying to assure Sabria that an air pistol doesn’t kick back when fired, like other pistols do.  Luckily the shot missed his big toe.  Sabria will remember the incident for perpetuity and laughs every time she tells it.  She gave Garey a Father’s Day card on Sunday that said, “Everything I need to know about being happy, I learned from you.”  It sums up their relationship, hole in the right shoe and all.

Besides extra shoes, I also have extra jackets and gloves.  These are for people, like our daughter, Natalie, and son-in-law, Scott, who come by when Garey is cutting wood for the winter, or he decides it’s the right day to dig sweet potatoes.  If somebody offers to help us work, I can usually come up with something that will fit—shoes, gloves, jackets and hats—so come on over around October, and I’ll fix you right up.

There are some items I refuse to have extras of, and it’s usually because Garey has enough extras of those items for all of Butler County.  If it can be bought in a can, we have it.  If Garey goes to the store to buy wasp spray, he’ll always come home with two cans, sometimes more.  It makes no difference if we have a single wasp nest in the eave over the back door.  I’ve come to believe he counts the wasps before he leaves then buys one can for each wasp in the nest.  I often wondered about Garey’s fascination with cans of stuff until we started cleaning out his mom’s bathroom closet.  Garey’s sister, Charlotte, was dividing the cans between the two of them.  There were boxes full.  I begged her to keep the lion’s share, so we wouldn’t have to add on an extra room.

If Garey were to write about my “extras” fetish, it would be glass jars full of hardware.  I have baby food jars and Heinz gravy jars containing nails, screws, bolts, nuts, hooks, picture hangers, corks, and one jar of stuff I can’t identify, but I don’t want to throw it away, because I’m afraid I might need it.

Having extra has become the American way.  I heard a pastor say once that we live under the illusion that there’s not enough to go around, and that’s why we gather and keep so much stuff that we really don’t need.  Extra has become our security.  Lately, I’ve felt smothered by extra, and I’ve felt a need to give things away, especially cans, but not the jars of hardware.  You can never have too many glass jars of extra nails.