Footprints

‘We have to get you some new school shoes,’ announced my mother. ‘There are some new shoes that have animal prints on the soles so when you walk in damp sand, you leave animal footprints!’ she said. I gasped. This was beyond my wildest imagination.

‘What sort of animal?’ I asked. She thought for a moment.

‘A kangaroo, of course!’ I had to have them! I wanted to walk around and leave roo paw prints in sand. Nothing could compare to that.

My mother and I made a special trip to the city and into the shoe store that would enable me to leave my unusual mark in the sand. I was seated in a special seat, my feet were measured, and prodded and poked until various types of shoes were put in front of me. They didn’t only have roo paws. There were goanna, lizard and even snake prints. But I knew what I wanted. Finally, a pair of roo paw shoes was brought to me. I slipped them on and walked around the shop testing the width and comfort of the brown school shoes. They were magnificent! I couldn’t wait to wear them to school. They were like a foot glove and whisper quiet on the carpet. My mother paid the assistant and we left the store with a huge shoe box full of my beloved kangaroo.

The Monday morning of my new shoe day at school began as usual. To say I was excited came nowhere close to describing my enthusiasm. I knew my classmates would be impressed and I was anticipating the new magnificence my roo paw prints would bring me.

I imagined the overwhelming reactions I would get from my classmates. The envy they would show my roo paw printed leather shoes. My footprints in sand!

I embraced my growing confidence and started walking slowly down the corridor with the wooden floorboards adjacent to our temporary weatherboard classroom that had stood for 10 years. I looked across at a group of my classmates by the lockers. They suddenly looked up and saw me. They looked from my face to my shoes and then back at my face. And then I heard it. The slow growl of laughter, the pointing fingers, the twisted awkward smirks on their faces.

‘We thought you were the teacher in those shoes. What are they — high heels?’ They fell about laughing and my roo paws fell into insignificance lying on the edge of my consciousness for many years to come.

I didn’t stop walking. I walked right past them, past the classroom and through the door at the rear end of the corridor, right back to where I had started.