My New Millennium shoes

Tennis anyone? If so, lace up your tennis shoes, wrap your sweat-band around your head and you are good to go. However, if you are like me - athletically challenged and harbor an aversion to sweating that melts your make-up, messes up your hairdo, overpowers your Giorgio Armani perfume, and you fear sweat that leaves gym equipment sticky, attracting all kinds of living organism bacteria - there is an alternative for us. It's the (newest) 'state of the art' shoe of this first decade into the second millennium.This sport shoe is advertised to firm the buttock and calf muscles, reduce the dreaded cellulite, tone your thighs, and promote weight loss. Their company slogan is: "Get in shape without setting a foot in a gym." After seeing the commercial for this promising shoe, I put down my third bowl of blended Skinny Cow chocolate and vanilla diet ice-cream, got off the couch, slipped on my go-ahead sandals, grabbed my keys and sprinted to my car. I drove down the street to the strip-mall where there was a shoe store. When I got there women were lined up in front of the doors. Some of them were holding a copy of the shoe store's glossy colored picture ad of the New Millennium Shoes. That's when I realized how expensive the shoes were. The ad read: Just $99.99 plus tax, while supplies last. "Ouch! That's quite a bite out of my budget at $50 dollars for each of my feet," I said to no one in particular when a large lady in front of me, wearing a jelly stained shirt and sipping a Starbuck mocha chocolate chip frappachino, echoed my sentiments. Another woman sporting a tattoo of Tinker Bell on her wide forearm chimed in, "Hey, a hundred bucks is still cheaper than a gym membership!" I agreed. Before long I was in the store trying on a pair of the New Millennium Shoes. Right away I noticed that I appeared to be taller. The clerk explained to me that I was indeed taller in these shoes "because of the built in kinetic wedge inserts." "Huh?" I was clueless. "To achieve maximum potential in your New Millennium Shoes you will have to do your part." "My part? What does that mean?" "Well, you will have to find your center of balance which means changing the way you are used to walking. The dynamic rolling feature may make you feel unstable or dizzy at first. It is important that your ankles do not bend inward or outward, but remain parallel to the position of your back. Your neck should be straight. Don't look down while you are walking." "How am I supposed to remember all that?" "That's easy; these shoes come with a DVD and booklet. There is also a support web site as well." "That is amazing when you consider that when I was 18 years old I was allowed to take a newborn baby (my own) out of the hospital with out so much as a manual. Now I will be better educated when I bring home a new pair of New Millennium shoes!" The young clerk was not amazed. "Lady, do you want the shoes or not?" "I'm thinking about it." "What's to think about? These shoes work even while you are standing and doing nothing." "Huh? How is that possible?" The clerk sighed deeply then said, "Conventional footwear does not provide proper support or aid in correct posture for long periods of standing. With these New Millennium Shoes the simulation of soft ground will ease the stress on your joints, promote correct posture and strengthen your legs, tighten buttock and abdominal muscles just by standing in them." "Wow! And they are only $99.99," I said emphatically. "I'll take them." I felt optimistic about the future as I stepped out in my New Millennium shoes. Yolanda Adele is a member of Writers' Workshop West in Downey.

********** Published: July 29, 2010 - Volume 9 - Issue 15