Now is as good a time as any to shed secrets: I can’t swim.
But for the past two years, I’ve taken up swimming.
What?
Oh, not the traditional kind. I swim on land. I swim on hard surfaces, although I prefer carpet to wood. These surfaces are floors. Specifically, the floors of the bedrooms I’ve had during the last twenty-four months. And whether it’s backstroke, butterfly stroke, or doggie paddling, I’m swimming around a little more than water buoys:
I’m swimming around shoes.
Shoes.
My favorite necessity (note: not accessory!), the joy of my wardrobe, the bane of my organization attempts. Because when you have as many shoes as there are years in a centennial celebration, there’s simply nowhere convenient for them to fit in One. Tiny. Bedroom.
And in the past two years, when I moved from college to home, from home to Moldova, from Moldova back to home, from home to Russia, from Russia back to home, and from home to Washington (new home), a massive pile of shoes appeared on each of my bedroom floors. This is because I’m an out-of-sight-out-of-mind person, so if I don’t see all my shoes, I may forget to pack necessary ones, and then I’ll get to a new location, put together an outfit, and realize I don’t have any shoes to go with it, so I’ll have to buy some. Not that that’s ever happened before. Enter the Renée-versus-shoes swim race.
It’s all just a money-saving move, really.
Allowed to take only two suitcases to Moldova for a year, I could bring few pairs of shoes (note: actual number not relevant). Before packing, I called my missionary mentors to ask what types of shoes were most useful. “Boots,” they responded. “Eastern Europeans love their boots.” I inserted a few into each suitcase, along with a medley of other shoe types, and arrived in Moldova only to find that most of the shoes I brought, I didn’t wear: boots were indeed king.
When I packed for Russia, I packed smarter: nearly all boots that time. Boots of different lengths and colors and linings for all seasons. Russia is cold, I reasoned. I’ll wear boots all year. No wasted suitcase space.
But I forgot that I would be flying to Russia in August.
Which, in the northern hemisphere, is a summer month. Even in Russia.
My first day in Russia was a sunny Saturday, and I donned dark brown, ankle-length boots to go grocery shopping. My fashion was high. So was my heat-index.
When my other team members arrived in Russia, they asked me, “Why are you wearing boots in summer?”
“Because you told me Eastern Europe was a boot culture!”
“Yeah, but not in summer!”
And then I looked around at the Russian women, and they were all clad in Roman sandals and wedge shoes.
Grrr.
Not only did my shoes warm my feet and I trudged through the streets; they also announced my presence to all who were within a 2-block radius of me.
You see, the boots I have aren’t fur-coated, soft-treading cozies. They are pointy-toed, silver-buckled, high-zippered, solid-heeled boots. And them thangs get loud.
Which is amplified when one is the only one on the streets wearing close-toed shoes.
Granted, other summery high-heels and even some flats can give off sound, but there’s something about the wide, solid base of a boot that gives a satisfying, hearty click which resonates a little more than the crackle of a stiletto.
What I’m saying is that every time I went down the street, people heard me coming.
Embarrassing when I’d walk to the bathroom in high school between classes, but not so in Russia.
Well, maybe at first.
I was shocked to so often hear the chatter of my feet, and I mentioned it to my roommate. “Sometimes I’m self-conscious because when I walk, I’m turning heads everywhere I go,” I laughed, bashful with recent memories. “Well, you just have to own it! If you don’t want to be heard, wear a tennis shoe. But if you’re going to wear boots, you have to own that click!”
Good point.
I could tread timidly, be heard, and cringe inwardly (and cave and wear less fashionable shoes and breathe easy because I could finally have silent feet), or I could keep going and walk like I meant it.
And when I thought about it that way, I realized that the cursed sound actually functioned as a blessed alert.
What?
You see, in Russia, I often walked alone. I commuted to school, went to church, shopped, and traveled to meetings alone. At nearly all hours of the day and night. Equipped with a cellphone, map, limited knowledge of the Russian language, and a fair-to-middling memory, I navigated the streets by myself.
In Russia I had to do things and go places at times of the day considered “unsafe” in my hometown in America; add on top of that a different country, unknown culture, and foreign language, and then put me in locations where the only option is to travel alone: that describes my first few months in Russia.
Fueled by prayers and established in the knowledge of the Lord’s provision, I didn’t look for ways to minimize my time outside the doors of my apartment. I knew that God equips those He calls, and I knew I was called to Russia at that time, even if I had to walk alone.
And that knowledge, paired with the afterglow of my roommate’s words, caused me to look at boot-clicks in a new light.
My first apartment was a good 15 minutes from access to the metro (subway) system, and walking home through dark, winding, silent streets with loud boots beating the sidewalk at a confident pace told anyone nearby that someone with purpose was coming. Navigating to a college campus in an ethnically-charged area of the city, I turned heads with my stomp as I walked on dirt paths and through iron gateways. Running toward the river to a friend’s house in the middle of the night because she needed help alerted people on the street to, well, get out of the way, because snowboot-girl was powering through with her tread.
I began to “own the click.” If nothing else, the sound let people know that the street was not empty and that a quick-paced human was coming their way. And to me, that sounds safer than creeping soft-soled around the corner and taking people by surprise.
I began to see—and hear—my boots as a blessing: In a sense, they kept me safe. Or at least safe-er.
They reminded me that I never walked alone.
I know as well as anyone else that I am no match for the streets of Russia. Or Butte, America. Or anywhere, for that matter. I need a little—or a lot—of aid in order to make it. I’ve since wondered if the clicking gave me confidence or if I put the confidence in my clicking. Either way, it reminded me that just as the shoes helped me stand out, the Lord helped me stand strong. I think of Habakkuk’s prayer in chapter 3 of his book which ends with an expression of trust: “God, the Lord, is my strength. He makes my feet like the deer’s; He makes me tread on my high places” (v. 19). “He makes my feet like the deer’s” can be translated as “He gives me sure-footed confidence.”
So, our strength-giving God puts us on rugged terrain, makes our feet strong, and gives us confidence to believe it.
To use the shoe-metaphor, He gives us both the click in our boots and the confidence to own our walk.
It wasn’t until I began to take psychological ownership of the click my shoes were making that I realized how providential the sound was, and how it pointed to the real reason I tread my Russian heights in safety.
The more my shoes clicked on through the months, the more I realized that my protection came less from what was on my feet and more from what was in them—and in my whole body: The indwelling God of strength Himself.
And He treads on high places, too.
Before the prophet Habakkuk’s time, the prophet Micah spoke to God’s people, and one of his themes was deliverance by God. In the first chapter of his book, he describes the Lord as “coming…down [out of His place to] tread upon the high places of the earth” (v. 3). God never asks us to do something He hasn’t done Himself.
Whatever your high place—whether a literal dark street or a sense of intense isolation or pressure to make decisions while feeling directionless or just the wearing grind of daily life—the strength-God has given you the shoes you need for this part of your life. All you have to do is put them on and walk—walk loudly, knowing that they won’t fail you. It’s yours for the believing.
- - - - - -
You may be relieved to know that as Russia’s winter months gave way to spring, I did purchase some quiet-soled sandals and trod the sidewalks in seasonally appropriate footwear.
But in my spirit, I was still loud-shoed.
Moral of the story: Wear boots. Lots of them. Loud ones.
Or maybe just on the inside.
Still stomping,
Renée
