Footpaths

It is Saturday. Saturday is the day Seventh Day Adventists worship. I was sitting on the porch waiting with my little hymn book Bea loaned me. My host family was getting ready for church. They said they would be leaving at 9:00 so I was ready on time. Silly me. I keep forgetting they have what they lovingly refer to as “Saint Lucian time”. I had my best dress on and a pair of dressy shoes…well, dressy by my standards; open toed backless sandals with heals. Going to church is the day when everyone puts on their best clothes. We didn’t actually leave until 11:30, but that was alright because it gave me some time to sit on the porch and reflect on the week.

As I listened to the activity going on in the house, I thought of my friend Jerene. She has a thing for shoes and has been the source of my supply since I met her in grad school. She has so many shoes she has become very creative in finding storage for them. So, if you ever have an occasion to visit her house, check her oven. I’m grateful that she and I wear the same size, although I do wish her feet were a bit wider.

Shoes are equally important to the women of Saint Lucia. I suppose women everywhere have the same shoe obsession that I’m accustomed to in the United States. However, they are expensive here which poses a problem for those that like to indulge in the obsession of footwear. My host family has two daughters living at home, Nina is twenty-four and Syisha is seventeen. They all love shoes, including their mom Bea.

It’s not uncommon to see women wearing three inch heals to work and to church. I’m sure Saint Lucian women must have the best balance in the world. Not many streets have sidewalks, and if they do, most are uneven with patched parcels of cement. Sidewalks are referred to as footpaths here. A footpath may be just a few feet and then the pedestrian is on their own to defend themselves against the speeding cars and vans on the highway. Politicians take great pride in funding them because when it comes to election time they can refer to something tangible that every village community will appreciate.

Syisha just returned from New York where she bought ten pair of shoes, mostly on sale, probably from Payless. She returned a week ago today with her bounty tied up in a white Hefty Bag that she retrieved from one of a dozen of suitcases. I sit here taking in the unfamiliar sights and smells of a typical Saturday morning in Saint Lucia: breakfasts of fried fish and salad, crowing roosters, goat noises, the smell of smoke in the air from those cooking outdoors, not because it’s fun, but because that’s the only method of cooking for some. And then I hear something so familiar . . . an argument over a pair of black three inch heels.