galloping boot love

Winter accessories are fun. Unlike hats, I don't name boots, even though they are high on my list of essential accoutrements. I've been crazy about boots since my first pair of rubber button-tab fold-overs. They looked just like the ones in the picture, only mine were white.

They were designed to wear over shoes, and were impossible to remove without taking off the shoe in the process. Even though they were waterproof, they were not quite tall enough to keep out deep snow, and just rubber enough to hold in melted snow. Even so, they made me feel invincible. They still do; boots are sexy, hip, and clip-clop when you walk.

I galloped everywhere as a child. Boots enabled me to splash in every puddle. One day, on my way home from school, in Michigan's spring thaw, I spotted the puddle of all puddles. This one required a running start. I backed up, galloped as hard as I could, leaped as high in the air as possible above the puddle.

What I didn't understand, was that the puddle was a hole near a construction site. I splashed alright; all the way up to my neck. It was a challenging, water-logged crawl out of the slippery mud. After dragging myself home, like a drowned mud-rat, my mother didn't believe me when I said I had just been slashing in a few puddles.



A few of my current favorite puddle-splashers...