Pinkers and Blackers

When I was a little girl my family wasn't exactly well off. My dad had a decent enough job, but there were a lot of kids in my family (I was the fifth of seven kids) and my mom was a stay-at-home mom, so our family was living on a single income. Needless to say, there wasn't a lot of extra money to go around for frills or luxuries.

When I was about three years old I only had one pair of shoes, and it was a pair of tennis shoes. That's what I wore when I went out in public, including church. Even though I was really young, I remember feeling embarrassed that I had to wear tennis shoes to church. I wanted pretty dress shoes like the other little girls had.

One day when I was about four years old my mom and I were out at a local shoe store called Kenny's and she found a steal. Not one, but TWO pairs of dress shoes. (You know the kind of   shoe that a lot of little girls wear that are shiny, faux patent leather-looking shoes with a strap that goes across the top of the foot?) One of the pairs was black and the other was pink and they were my size and only two dollars apiece! I treasured those shoes that I affectionately dubbed my "pinkers and blackers." My mom said that it was the best four dollars she ever spent because those shoes made me so happy. It's the small things in life that make it so grand!