The Shoes Laced On at the Bench

The doctor and the slippers

The foot doctor comes down from Iowa City twice a month and sees people at the clinic by the hospital. She’s a young woman with a quiet voice, and she takes her time. Kimber had said she had a dentist appointment that Monday, so I took the afternoon off and drove Dad myself.

The doctor unwrapped his heel and looked at it a long time. Then she looked at the slippers sitting on the floor beside the exam table.

“Mr. Garrity,” she said, “the last time I saw you, we talked about proper shoes. Extra depth, a firm heel, room in the toe. Did you get some?”

“I did,” Dad said. “Abram Feldkamp fitted me himself. Best shoes I ever had on my feet, for about ten minutes.”

“Then why are you in these?”

“They were the wrong width,” Dad said. “My daughter-in-law said they had to send them back and reorder. Takes a while, I guess, this time of year.”

The doctor frowned a little. She did not say anything against anybody. She just said that a soft slipper with no back lets the heel slide every step, and every slide rubs that sore open a little more.

“It was healing,” she said. “Now it isn’t. I need those shoes on him this week, not next month.”

I said I would see to it. I asked her whether Medicare would pay part, because I remembered reading something. She said it would, through a medical supply place with a prescription and a fitting, but the closest one she worked with had a five-week wait.

“Abram Feldkamp has fitted half the diabetic feet in this county,” she said. “If he fitted him, that’s the right shoe. Get it back on him.”

Pink paper

So that was the afternoon I went looking for a pen and found that slip instead.

I didn’t say anything to Dad right away. I helped him into the car. I buckled him in, because his hands don’t like the latch anymore. Then I stood outside his door for a minute with the cold coming through my coat.

I want to be honest about what I felt. My first thought was to drive straight out to Thaddeus and Kimber’s place on the county road and walk in her kitchen door without knocking.

I could see it all. I could hear what I’d say. And I could see what would come after it, too.

Kimber would cry, or she would yell. Either way she would be done driving Dad. She’d tell Thaddeus I’d attacked her, and he’d be stuck between us in the middle of harvest. And on Tuesday morning, my father would be sitting in his kitchen with his coat on and no ride to the clinic.

A fight with Kimber would have felt good for about an hour. It would have cost Dad his rides for months. I wasn’t going to trade his heel for my temper.

So I got in the car. I pulled out my phone. And I called the shoe store.