Here’s an article in the Orange County Register: Hey fashionistas: barefoot is back. The author, Cindy McNatt, give us a photo of a barefoot Jean Shrimpton in the 1960s and Kate Moss from recently (both are models, for those who don’t know).
Ms. McNatt then notes how barefoot sandals are really taking off, and points us to Etsy, which has a large supply of them. So I guess somebody must be buying. Here is one sample:
Tatted Barefoot Sandals
Of course, barefoot sandals are not really bare, but I think they are close enough to count. They act mainly as decoration (fashion!), not any sort of foot restriction like the mislabeled “barefoot running shoes”. By leaving the soles free, they still provide all the tactile feedback that we barefooters not only appreciate but have come to rely upon when it comes to helping out foot strength, circulation, joint health, and balance.
Ms. McNatt also mentions how in the ’50s and ’60s all the kids in southern California went barefoot all summer long. Again, it’s amazing how something so common not that long ago has been so demonized so quickly.
Relating this to the Statehouse Sneakers, I really wonder how they would react to barefoot sandals. After all, as whitbybarefootrunner intimated, they are foot wear, which satisfies the letter (but probably not the intent) of the new Statehouse rule.
(H/T: Beach Bum in this comment.)
I plan on wearing barefoot sandals at the next triathlon I enter for next year, if they maintain the shoe rule. They are technically sandals and therefore shoes.
Bob, since there are so many regional differences with regards to people going barefoot in the US, what do you see in your neck of the woods? Do you ever see others barefoot in public? In stores? Just walking through town? How has it changed over the years? From what I keep reading about on the internet, the midwest has the least amount of people going barefoot these days, along with new england. What are your statistical observations?
Beach Bum: No, I see no others, besides a few of my local friends who also go barefoot. About the best I can do is notice the few pictures in the local paper (that I’ve shared on this blog).
Let me take that back, slightly. There is a family across the street in which some of the kids don’t worry about going barefoot, even into the street, and even in their teen years. And once, while hiking in Hocking Hills at Conkle’s Hollow, I ran across another barefoot hiker. But that’s pretty much it.
Wow, that is a big difference from what I am seeing in Florida. And I thought it was pretty dismal here. I guess not. I see quite a few people barefoot in their yards and driveways, getting in and out of cars barefoot, both kids and adults. Once in a while I see someone pumping gas barefoot, going in and out of convenience stores and such. Sometimes I see people barefoot in supermarkets, but that is usually in beach towns, though I have seen a few here and there in supermarkets 15 or 20 miles from the beach, though that is not very frequent. CVS and Mcdonalds are also a few places I saw people go barefoot into. For some odd reason, september of this year had the most barefoot people in public that I had seen in a while, more that month than most of the rest of the year. Probably just a statistical fluke and a coincidence. Of course, there are all those people walking to and from the beach, which I am not counting. It is also worth mentioning that I occasionally see some guys without shirts going into convenience stores and just wandering around the streets, some with shoes and some without. And it does happen beyond the beach towns occasionally, even in places that have the NSNSNS signs.