Tonya is right, spring has sprung. And while I couldn’t be more thrilled to have pushed the “bundle me” to the back of the closet, the promise of warmer weather does bring up a few particular concerns. It just so happens that I enjoy winter fashions. A gigantic down coat that covers every inch of my body from neck to ankle can hide a multitude of sins – and I don’t exactly look forward to trading it in for this seasons torturous mini-skirts or short-shorts (over my dead body). So imagine my excitement when I noticed Oprah was rerunning her “accessories intervention” show, which promised that by simply changing my bag and shoes, I would look taller, thinner and younger. Did the shoes come with new legs I wondered? Are there bags with some fancy newfangled technology that would suck the fat directly out of my ass while I’m walking down the street? Why had I spent the last twenty years of my life trying to look thinner by WEARING CLOTHES THAT MADE ME LOOK LESS FAT when I could have just changed my damn shoes???. Like the rest of America, I would now look to Oprah for all the answers.
First up was Kathleen who had a “fondness for leopard print.” I knew immediately that I was in big trouble because while the leopard print was in fact a problem, I knew that the team of style gurus Oprah had collected were not going to let the next little detail just slide by. Poor Kathleen was wearing leopard print CLOGS. As our fab designer Carrie has been known to say, there are three things she can’t live without. Her husband, her child, and her clogs – and I understand completely. I bought my first pair of clogs when my daughter was three weeks old. I was in the “oh, it’s really true that you can’t take a shower” phase. As all you mothers out there know, the realization that putting on mascara, brushing your hair and god forbid tying shoes takes too much time is shocking. It was a dark time, but then I was finally beginning to understand why many of the mothers of Park Slope could be seen sporting the uber-practical “dansko clog”. I never found them to be especially fashionable, but they didn’t have laces and I suspected they were comfortable. My feet, not kidding, have never hurt again and I’ve worn them nearly every single day for the last two years. So, as you may imagine, I felt a little sensitive about Kathleen being attacked on national television over her love of clogs.
The accessories team assured Kathleen that her love of animal print was no problem – an asset in fact! She just needed to make it “sexier.” What were the clogs replaced with? Leopard print stilettos of course! The audience oohed and ahhed over how much younger, sexier and just hotter she looked. Yeah, duh. I agree that I would look hotter in four-inch heels. However, how much hotter would I be in a neck brace? Because I assure you that a neck brace is the next accessory I would be sporting. Five seconds on the playground in heels (assuming I even made it that far) and I would sustain injuries requiring traction, extensive reconstructive surgery. . . and the final piece de resistance – the neck brace.
Oprah, I know you mean well. I agree that the woman who had tiny pigs on the toes of her flats needed to be set straight. I also agree that it’s just plain tacky to wear socks and sneakers with a business suit. But isn’t there some sort of happy medium between all out sexy and functional? I know my beloved clogs wouldn’t exactly receive the Carrie Bradshaw seal of approval, and I’d like to do better. But please don’t tell me a four-inch heel is the answer. Because to borrow a phrase from Oprah, “there’s one thing I do know”, and that’s there’s no shoe that looks good with a neck brace.