Anybody that knows me knows that I don’t spend a boatload of
money on clothes and shoes. Like most guys who work in an office, or who go out
to visit customers, I have just the right number of suits hanging in my closet,
and the appropriate number of pairs of shoes to match those suits. I like ties,
but I don’t go overboard, and I haven’t yet sent away to Hong Kong for a trunk
load of custom-made shirts (although I have often thought about it).
I’m not a video game freak, and I’m not a serious sports fan.
Ask anybody, I’m definitely not a fan of massage (somebody I don’t know,
touching me, ewww), and I don’t go to the bar or out for wings. My lovely wife
won’t let me buy a new car because she says I’m just gonna smash it up anyway. All
this to say, that I don’t usually splash out on things for myself. I just don’t.
I’m not proud of that, and I don’t try to be like that. It’s just not something
I do.
There is one thing I do, that’s just for me, and it’s
something that people don’t really think of often. In fact, it’s something that
was once really popular, and now seems on the verge of going completely out of
vogue. I really enjoy getting a shoe-shine.
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| It seems like an old-fashioned indulgence. From before things like shoes were disposable. |
Where else, for under ten bucks can you sit down, and ten
minutes later, get up and walk out with a new spring in your step. It’s like
getting your car detailed. Dirt goes away, cracks and scuffs get repaired, a
wash, a buff, and a new coat of wax. Right before your eyes. I’m astonished
every time I sit down. Whether it’s the boys at Walters Shoe Shine at the
Toronto Airport, Chico at the Montreal Airport, or the folks at Penny Loafers
in the basement of the Royal York Hotel, in ten minutes these pros have you
looking and feeling like a new man. Or woman, although I’ve never in my life
sat beside a woman in the shoe-shine throne.
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| Quite possibly the only 10 minutes in my week where I feel like the King of the Castle |
And a throne it is. It’s almost overwhelming. You climb the
stairs to sit in the big chair, and you look down on all the people walking by.
Many of them look up at you like…”Poncy flake…nothing but time to sit there and
have somebody shine your shoes…” Think what you want, these people are pros,
and I’m gonna do anything I can do to add lifespan to my fifty buck wingtips. And
for 10 minutes I feel like a king. ‘And
you, Mr. Dirty Shoes walking by, you’re banished to gate B494. Sit there and
thing about those salt stains for a while. Don’t judge me.’ This is
actually the conversation I have running in my head.
I do shine at home, but it never comes out just the same. I’ve
got my polishes and brushes, and all the other stuff I need to do the job, but
I can’t get it right. If you recall, I wrote about a pair of brown shoes that I
bought back in the fall. I was wearing them the other day in Montreal, and I
stopped for a five-buck shoe-shine. I sat there in awe as Chico put a shine so
bright on those shoes that I could see my face in them. Without a word of a
lie, shiner than when I bought them. How could you say no to that kind of
little luxury.
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| Thanks Chico...They're Awesome. |
