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PLASTIC DOESN'T BREATHE |
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by Charles Carreon
One summer I was too poor to buy new shoes. When my old ones got really worn out, like falling apart to where you look psychotic if you wear them in town, I took to going barefoot when I went to town. That was funny. I used to go barefoot all the time When I was younger, but now, with all these kids, I felt like a poor hillbilly. Finally, when I got a little cash, I broke down and got a pair of blue jogging shoes at Sprouse-Reitz for five dollars. They were even too big but they were cheap. So I wore them without socks and looked psychotic. What I discovered after I'd owned them for a while was that they weren't made of rubber, as I'd assumed; they were made of plastic. I knew because they clicked when I walked on linoleum, and nobody's Nike's or Adidas ever did that. Eventually I discovered that they were plastic in every detail, from the thread to the fabric, to the insole to the tongue to the wrap-around leather-looking stuff that's supposed to be suede but is as plastic as everything else. And none of it breathed. Plastic doesn't breathe. It doesn't inhale or exhale And it's not holding its breath. Eventually my feet got sick of those shoes. They were too big, they made me look psychotic, and they didn't breathe. I threw them away and breathed a sigh of relief. Those shoes had started to give me the creeps.
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