14 Feb 10 Shoes on a Wire: Love is the Drug?

In a previous post entitled ‘The postmodern dilema‘ I posted a similar photo of some high heel shoes hanging from power lines.  In the article I posed the question (rather naively as it turns out) “do people create such spectacles out of an innate need to produce art?”.  A reader subsequently informed me that shoes hanging from a wire is a clandestine indication that drugs are available nearby.  I have never been able to look at a pair of shoes hanging from the wires again in the same way; you can’t help but wonder, okay, where are the drug dealers hanging out?  Usually, of course, the shoes are a grubby old pair of trainers.

More than a year later, who ever strung up the stylish ladies shoe (featured left) continues to maintain this piece of post modern installation art.  What then is the cryptic significance of ladies heels hanging from the wires?  Is a better class of drug available in this location, or is something quite different available, ‘love for sale’ perhaps?

Since reaching the dreaded ‘middle aged’ milestone, I seem to have developed something of an obsession with shoes.  Scuffed old trainers will no longer do; shoes need to be carefully chosen and colour coordinated with a range of different styles of outfit.  The usual stereotype is women being shoe obsessed while men pay very little attention to this all important detail of any outfit.  Perhaps this is less the case with older men, or perhaps it’s just me.  Either way, I’m starting to develop such a shoe collection my friends are starting to call me ‘Imelda’.  It certainly seems a shame to me that otherwise well dressed men often resort to wearing an ugly pair of modern trainers as some kind of misguided concession to looking casual.  Modern trainers have all the style of a rocket launcher and don’t look good with anything, despite the delusion that many labour under.  Look down; you really never have seen anything more incongruous and UGLY!

Perhaps I would prefer not to be enlightened on the significance of ladies shoes hanging from wires.  I really would rather hold on to the delicious mysteries they conjure up.  Perhaps if more dealers advertised with a better class of shoes, they might increase their sales while setting an excellent example and performing a much needed public service:  grubby old trainers should never be seen, not even hanging from the power lines!

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Tags: Clothing, Footwear, Heel, High-heeled footwear, postmodern, postmodernism, Shoe, Shopping, Women's