Stilettos, anyone?

Some days call for 3-inch heels and a mean walk that's aided by those heels, of course. Mind you, I never wear heels so these days are certainly interesting experiments in mind over matter (and balance). Today, I practiced walking in these little black monsters in my house before braving the walk between my door and the car. It's not a far walk but it's rough being that it's not really a path so much as chunky lava rock and tall grass. Heels were not made for this sort of territory but are more for the smooth sidewalks and asphalt of a city. Smart woman that I am, I grabbed my Chacos on the way out the door because, let's face it, heels ain't for no wimp and I'm not sure if I'm brave enough to make it through a whole day with these things strapped to my feet.

Nevertheless, in their defense, they give a body a little more "umph" even if it's slightly staccato in nature. Something about wearing them spouts, "Yeah, look at me up on these things. I know I'm hot. I bet I could even do the high-wire, no problem."

Here's a little history: high heels have actually been around for quite some time, dating back to the Hellenic period. Since then, they have gone through many transformations and, depending on the culture, have been worn for many purposes and by both genders. For example, Mongolian horsemen used them to keep their feet from slipping out of their stirrups and Egyptian butchers used them to keep their feet out of the blood and mess of their work. In this sense, high heels have quite a practical function.

So why am I wearing them and why do countless women wear them to work day after day? It's not like we're riding our horses to work or having to step through pig and cow parts along the way. (Well, at least not literally, maybe metaphorically.) I can't answer for anyone else but, for me, because I wear them so rarely it's like a new experience. The world looks a little different standing 3 more inches off the ground. Plus my calves bulge a little more and my hips sway differently and more, shall I say, enticingly. They're fun. In my case they're totally impractical. They're downright absurd, actually. But most things in life are anyway so, if you can't beat it, might as well join, or so they say.

Last night, I began seriously reading "The Continuum Concept." (I say seriously because I have this horrible habit of reading about 4 books at a time as if I'm some sort of literary junkie who can't get her fix on just one book. So, I'm attempting to focus on this book until completion - should be interesting.) The point is - yes, back to the bloody point - that the author, Jean Liedloff, experienced something quite extraordinary when she spent a substantial amount of time with various Indian tribes who lived (and hopefully still do) in the jungles of the Amazon. In stark contrast to our Western way of doing things and seeing things, the people of these tribes had no concept of unhappiness. She gives example after example of the ways in which they lived and how they didn't even have a word for "work." Here's an excerpt:

Here before me were several men engaged in a single task. Two, the Italians, were tense, frowning, losing their tempers at everything, and cursing nonstop in the distinctive manner of the Tuscan. The rest, Indians, were having a fine time. They were laughing at the unwieldiness of the canoe, making a game of the battle, relaxed between pushes, laughing at their own scrapes and especially amused when the canoe, as it wobbled forward, pinned one, then another, underneath it. The fellow held bare-backed against the scorching granite, when he could breathe again, invariably laughed the loudest, enjoying his relief.

All were doing the same work, all were experiencing strain and pain. There was no difference in our situations except that we had been conditioned by our culture to believe that such a combination of circumstances, constituted an unquestionable low on the scale of well-being, and we were quite unaware that we had any option in the matter.

But what if we realize that we do, indeed, have options insofar as how we react to what life throws at us? I remember this moment in High School like it was yesterday -

It was during my AP Biology class with Ms. Lentz. It was a gorgeous day and we were outside at the beach. The whales had come to town and we were watching them. I was walking alongside my good friend, Brittany, and we were having a conversation about the way things are set up in our neck of the woods, being the Western world. Even then as a 17-year old teenager, I had a strong sense that, excuse my French, things were fucked up and, though it appeared we were quite privileged, we obviously got the short end of the stick as far as cultures go. I don't remember our exact conversation but the gist was this: How is it that people have to work these ridiculous jobs that, admittedly, they don't really like, just so that they can have money to buy food that, really, they could grow themselves? How is it that our economy, our whole way of life, is based on consumerism? How shallow and empty is that?

Thirteen years later, I'm pondering the same thing and, moreover, I am wracking my brain as to how to exist within this sort of system in a way that feels like my soul is not being eaten. In all honesty, I could give a shit about money. That's my soul speaking. My mind says something quite different and echoes the study that was recently done where researchers found that, indeed, money does make people happy. Okay, maybe it doesn't make people happy but they found that when people made a certain amount, well above the poverty line, of course, they were better able to care for themselves and overall quality of life improved. I buy that argument in this culture, I do. However, in reading about the ways of indigenous people, I get the sense that they have access to a happiness we could never fathom in our capitalistic, competitive system. They don't compete with one another. They live communally, in genuine support of one another's overall well-being. They live in absolute harmony with the jungle that surrounds them, whereas, we are constantly fighting with nature whether it's spraying "Round-up" on roadside "weeds" (I put weeds in quotes because I don't really believe there is such a thing.) or mono-cropping or genetically modifying our food (even newly manufactured GMO salmon is being considered for commercial sale). We're constantly altering, meddling with, or downright fighting with nature to the point that, in my opinion, we're going to drive ourselves into extinction because the planet's going to finally kick us off for being such parasites. I can just imagine when we're gone the planet giving a great big sigh of relief then rubbing her planetary hands together and saying, "Good riddance!"

You might be asking yourself, how did this entry go from the history of high heels to human extinction? I'm not exactly sure myself only that walking on heels reminds me of our precarious position on the planet these days. On the one hand, there's some of us who seem to "get it" even if it means not taking one of those godforsaken plastic bags home with us from the grocery store. And then there's those of us who, quite frankly, need to wake the fuck up. I say to those people, "Get your head out of your air-conditioned Hummer (which, by the way, is, like, so passe) and smell the exhaust." In all seriousness though, I wonder if there's a way to go back a little. It's doubtful that those of us in the Western world could easily return to a life on the land like the Indians. (Okay, maybe some of us could.) But, too many of us are so reliant on our iphones, our ipads and itouches and ifarts and whatever else there is that a life in nature is downright scary. But there must be some compromise. There must be a way. I'm working on it. Until I come to some reasonable solutions, I leave you with a poem...


Plum juice
dripping down my arm
and chin
Fleshy and luscious softness
meeting my lips and mouth
Is there any sweeter satisfaction
than this intoxication
that inhabits the briefest and
most heavenly of moments?