Soon it will be made an Olympic competition, and I will be America's top contender
It snows almost every day here in Michigan and snow and ice is piled onto the streets and sidewalks like nobody's (everybody's) business. For this I left the cool winds of Alabama winter, where you could almost manage to leave the house without a jacket and where the small snowflakes melted as soon as they hit the ground. Here the snowflakes are thick and serious. They bunch together and smack you in the face on their way down.
Weather like this deserves snow boots that are just as thick and serious. Shame that they're also very ugly boots, but I've never had boots that were warmer or worked better when you have to wade through two or more feet of snow every so often on your walks through town (and many more feet where the snow has piled up from being cleared from the road). I have terrible balance and could slip on an ice shaving if you gave me the opportunity. Proper boots are essential.
The problem, though, arises when I am trying to run out the door to catch the bus. Do you know how long these boots take to lace up? And they are always almost completely unlaced to begin with, due to their essential sturdiness. The Greek god Hephaestus couldn't pry my foot from these boots unless they were completely unlaced, let alone poor, mortal me when I've just arrived home for the day. I could share with you a number of stories where I tugged and nothing happened and I tugged harder and ended up brutally kicking myself in the leg, but obviously I'm too dignified to admit such instances ever took place.
So I unlace all the way for the path of least resistance. This of course means that when I'm putting them on before leaving, I have to lace them all the way up again. This does not go well for someone who plans her departure down to thirty-second increments so she leaves at just the right time to arrive at the bus stop before it comes, without having to wait too long in the cold and without having to wave my hands wildly as I run down the street toward the bus, hoping the driver sees me and takes pity so I don't miss the bus. I'm not saying this has ever happened, repeatedly, but hypothetically speaking I'm sure it is not a pleasant situation.
Lacing the boots up took way too much time. But they had to be completely unlaced or the foot couldn't have come out in the first place, and the last thing I want to do after huffing and puffing over the ordeal of extracting my foot from the boots of mighty terror is re-lace them there and then. That would be far too unbearable a solution when it could much more easily be solved by putting it off until tomorrow. So re-lacing comes as I put them back on, as I depend upon fate and my able fingers in the morning, when I am at my least alert.
But because everything I do has significance and drama and fantastical consequences, this task has been converted into a mission not so ordinary as one would think the lacing of snow boots might entail. This is no mundane chore, but rather an undertaking the likes of which have rarely been seen outside the Olympic arena.
Every day I test myself a little further. How fast will it take you to lace your boots today? Can you do it in under thirty seconds for each boot? That was the first challenge, and I am mildly ashamed to say that on that first day I did not meet it. But I remembered the stench of failure and every day after that my focus has been guided by both a deep discipline within me and, I do not doubt, the very hands of God.
Thirty seconds? Child's play. My average is around twenty-five seconds per boot, with seven out of eight rows of bootlace holes laced up in that time (the eighth row at the bottom is where the lace stays threaded when unlacing to take the boots off). On days when the light shone upon me with a special hue of glory, I managed it in as little as twenty-two seconds, which is roughly one and a half seconds per bootlace grommet thingy. Yes, I was as astonished as likely you are.
It seems my talent, though fostered at an older age than I would imagine is recommended for the sport of speed-boot-lacing, is well within its period of greatness. I am sure I will improve as the weeks go by. I must take advantage of this while I may, before my hands become riddled with arthritis and the mottled, dry skin of old age. I have years of competitiveness in me. All I need do is wait for the time when my skills might be recognized by an organized body of people who revel in the value of the quick lacing of boots. I am sure I am not alone in my belief that I have stumbled upon a sport of both virtue and substance. My journey from here on will certainly be exciting.
Weather like this deserves snow boots that are just as thick and serious. Shame that they're also very ugly boots, but I've never had boots that were warmer or worked better when you have to wade through two or more feet of snow every so often on your walks through town (and many more feet where the snow has piled up from being cleared from the road). I have terrible balance and could slip on an ice shaving if you gave me the opportunity. Proper boots are essential.
The problem, though, arises when I am trying to run out the door to catch the bus. Do you know how long these boots take to lace up? And they are always almost completely unlaced to begin with, due to their essential sturdiness. The Greek god Hephaestus couldn't pry my foot from these boots unless they were completely unlaced, let alone poor, mortal me when I've just arrived home for the day. I could share with you a number of stories where I tugged and nothing happened and I tugged harder and ended up brutally kicking myself in the leg, but obviously I'm too dignified to admit such instances ever took place.
So I unlace all the way for the path of least resistance. This of course means that when I'm putting them on before leaving, I have to lace them all the way up again. This does not go well for someone who plans her departure down to thirty-second increments so she leaves at just the right time to arrive at the bus stop before it comes, without having to wait too long in the cold and without having to wave my hands wildly as I run down the street toward the bus, hoping the driver sees me and takes pity so I don't miss the bus. I'm not saying this has ever happened, repeatedly, but hypothetically speaking I'm sure it is not a pleasant situation.
Lacing the boots up took way too much time. But they had to be completely unlaced or the foot couldn't have come out in the first place, and the last thing I want to do after huffing and puffing over the ordeal of extracting my foot from the boots of mighty terror is re-lace them there and then. That would be far too unbearable a solution when it could much more easily be solved by putting it off until tomorrow. So re-lacing comes as I put them back on, as I depend upon fate and my able fingers in the morning, when I am at my least alert.
But because everything I do has significance and drama and fantastical consequences, this task has been converted into a mission not so ordinary as one would think the lacing of snow boots might entail. This is no mundane chore, but rather an undertaking the likes of which have rarely been seen outside the Olympic arena.
Every day I test myself a little further. How fast will it take you to lace your boots today? Can you do it in under thirty seconds for each boot? That was the first challenge, and I am mildly ashamed to say that on that first day I did not meet it. But I remembered the stench of failure and every day after that my focus has been guided by both a deep discipline within me and, I do not doubt, the very hands of God.
Thirty seconds? Child's play. My average is around twenty-five seconds per boot, with seven out of eight rows of bootlace holes laced up in that time (the eighth row at the bottom is where the lace stays threaded when unlacing to take the boots off). On days when the light shone upon me with a special hue of glory, I managed it in as little as twenty-two seconds, which is roughly one and a half seconds per bootlace grommet thingy. Yes, I was as astonished as likely you are.
It seems my talent, though fostered at an older age than I would imagine is recommended for the sport of speed-boot-lacing, is well within its period of greatness. I am sure I will improve as the weeks go by. I must take advantage of this while I may, before my hands become riddled with arthritis and the mottled, dry skin of old age. I have years of competitiveness in me. All I need do is wait for the time when my skills might be recognized by an organized body of people who revel in the value of the quick lacing of boots. I am sure I am not alone in my belief that I have stumbled upon a sport of both virtue and substance. My journey from here on will certainly be exciting.