Heels and your inner dwarf: the balancing act

I had a heated discussion with my boyfriend the other day. It started with me asking him to ‘walk slower’.

To be clear, I am not one of those sidewalk hogging, stop-to-smell-the roses, dawdling-all-over-the-footpath-driving-everyone-nuts types. I like to move with purpose and as quickly as my fairly short legs will allow.

On this occasion, however, I was wearing the wrong shoes.

As any practical girl is aware, footwear can make or break an evening. The wrong shoes can cause a whole range of painful conditions: chaffing, rubbing, aching and tugging. In addition to these undesirable physical ailments, the wrong shoes can also affect what can only be described as massive personality shifts.

In the wrong shoes, one can become a demented caricature that wouldn’t be out of place at the table of the Disney dwarves who flat-shared with Snow White. Note, Ms White always wore practical shoes, and did not succumb to such bizarre personality extremes as her housemates.

‘Slow’ I find particularly objectionable, but also ‘shitty’, ‘cold’ and ‘tired’. They are the sort of personalities even the very patient Snow White wouldn’t want hanging around, but they are unfortunately prevalent among the fashion-conscious set.

The personalities come out to play when one has inappropriately chosen to wear ‘pretty’ shoes instead of ‘practical’ shoes. And yes, the two are mutually exclusive.

Which brings us to the argument..*ahem*… discussion. After requesting that we slow down, I gestured to my black patent wedges, ‘I can’t walk fast in these’. Despite being from the side of the human species that has little to no care for non-functional clothing, I expected just a little understanding from my usually empathetic man.

Wrong. Without slowing the pace, he delivered the punch – ‘Guys don’t care whether you wear heels, you know.’

‘Yes, you do care, because heels make women look like they have longer, skinnier legs and that’s what all men want.’ Take that, I thought, cringing at my over simplistic argument but maintaining my self-righteous inner monologue: it’s your fault I can’t walk right now, and have succumbed to my inner grump.

He then had the nerve to tell me that ‘Women only wear heels to impress other women’.

‘Not even worth a retort’, I huffed. Besides, I was out of breath from trying to match his pace which was not wedge-heel appropriate by any stretch of the imagination.

This is the point in the article where I could deliver my ‘which made me question… do we really only wear heels to impress other women?’ line. But even sitting here in my ug-boots, having long ago banished the illogical and ill-conceived arguments of the inner grump, I maintain: women do wear heels to impress men. And yes, men do care.

Exhibit A: men’s magazines. I know it’s a cheap shot. But they make it so easy. When is the last time Ralph featured a chick in a bikini and joggers? Unsurprisingly, Ricky Lee Coulter and the Sexy FIFA World Cup Fans are ready to race in ten-inch stilettos. There’s a slideshow online if you don’t believe me. OK, so not many of the pictures include anything below the waist, but there are no flat-footed bettys to be seen.

Even if the magazine caters to ‘the fun loving Australian male who has a fine appreciation for the good looking women of the world’, (their words not mine), you better hope those good looking women also have a reasonable shoe allowance. Not because they are desperate to impress their girlfriends with their knack for matching g-strings and slingbacks but because that is what the male readership wants to see.

I’m well aware that the average readership of Ralph does not accurately represent the diverse and undoubtably refined tastes of the Australian male public. And far be it from me to condemn those enlightened and practical fellas. They might in fact, find Doc Martens sexy. Yes they’re cool in an early-90s, Winona Ryder-in-checked-shirt, Seattle grunge-rock, chocolate pop-tarts for breakfast, lunch and dinner kinda way. But sexy?

I have never worn flat shoes to impress a date. But I understand the implications of choosing bad shoes. And I know I would not impress any men or women were I to unleash the culminated symptoms of an uncomfortable night on the town.

It comes down to a balance between looking good and being non-psychopathic.

Although some men like the look of heels, they don’t ever enjoy the personalities that come with the grand discomfort of ‘the wrong shoes’. They also don’t enjoy a date that needs to be navigated from car to restaurant back to car as if on crutches.

This is the point that we can agree on. It kills the romance of a post-dinner splash through the puddles. It negates any possibility of someone taking the long way round so they can talk to you just a little bit more before the night is over. Why take a stroll if every step is a wince closer to the emergence of the tired/shitty/cold monster?

I have determined the balance needs to make me happy first. I know my boyfriend likes the way I look in heels, but I know I enjoy myself when I can move freely. It’s not a wholehearted embrace of Doc Martens but perhaps a wink in their direction. I get it sister.