(c) photographs by Claudia Levin
Browsing my Facebook feed this morning, I was stopped at the
sight of these two photographs, taken by Claudia Levin, with the short text: “I
left the house and in front of the door... shoes that tell a story.”
Associatively, intuitively, I saw violence, rape,
exploitation, pain, tears, and sadness in my mind’s eye. I started to comment
something in that direction, but then I stopped.
Yes, the shoes tell a story – but maybe it’s a story of
midnight pleasure, of taking the shoes off with a loud laugh and walking
barefoot home, feeling the cool asphalt.
Maybe she was alone, maybe on a pleasantly surprising first
date which continued until dawn, maybe with a partner, or friends.
Maybe she was sad, maybe she lost her cat and couldn’t
continue walking in those high heels, while searching for the cat. Or dog.
Or – maybe she finally understood the physical price she’s
been paying for years for wearing such high heels and decided right then and
there to just shed them off her forever.
And yes, maybe the story is that of my first association –
of violence, of a woman in prostitution badly beaten, or a woman dragged to a
corner to be viciously raped, losing her high heels while her feet scratched
the sidewalk.
And maybe none of the above.
Why am I writing this post? Just a feeling that I wanted to
put this in writing, to document. For some reason, after thinking about them
all day, these particular shoes and the way they are positioned in the middle
of the sidewalk, seem to tell a very special story. And my gut feeling is that
the story has a good end as dawn breaks. A feeling that their owner whispered
into the night, to no one in particular but herself, “carpe diem” as she was
taking them off. Just a feeling.
