Not Just Another Pretty Foot

    Why do so many people react to bare feet in public like they have just witnessed a Burmese Python swallow an entire box of puppies and kittens?! Why are they so repulsed by the sight of bare feet attached to the long end of bare legs? Nobody I know gets upset about bare legs, bare arms, bare shoulders, bare hands, and these days pretty much any bare body part, in public -- just don't let those funny appendages attached to our shins and calves run naked!

    Would those horrified reactions change to acceptance if our feet looked differently than they do? Our feet look somewhat similar to our hands, they are just located at the southern end of our bodies, which is a good thing as it makes it much more difficult for us to pick our noses with our toes'es -- fingers are much faster at a sinus showdown anyway. So which is more disgusting again, toes or fingers?

     Dr. Suess wrote in The Foot Book: "Front feet. Back Feet. Red feet. Black feet. Left foot. Right foot. Feet, feet, feet. How many, many feet you meet." However, in today's snooty society, we don't get to meet too many feet anymore because we are trained that we must hide them from views with shoes. But what if our feet looked like feet drawn on the many characters created by author and illustrator, Dr. Suess? Fuzzy, furry and fun! He may not have been a Dr. of podiatry, but he sure knew how to help people feel more comfortable about their feet.

Feet by Dr. Suess

     Stop them dogs of yours from barking, take off those shoes! Would it be more socially acceptable for humans to be barefoot in public if our feet looked like Fido's?  

      Maybe somewhere over the rainbow bare footing in public would be acceptable if our feet looked like this:

  Or, what if our feet looked like the feet in a child's drawing of a typical stick figure person? Round, ball-like feet were always depicted in my masterpieces. Would bare feet be less offensive shaped like that? The balls of our feet would take on a whole new meaning. Would we even still have balls of our feet, or heels for that matter, if we have balls for feet? So for those of us who prefer going barefoot, if we bared our balls, let them roll out there freely while we are out and about in public -- oh grow up, I am talking about our round feet -- would that be more acceptable? Another plus having round feet, when we are asked why we don't wear shoes we can say, "that's just how we roll!"       

Here's another thought, what if the Earth's polar axis suddenly switched places, as has happened numerous times throughout Earth's long history, but this time as a consequence of this event our feet anatomically switched places with our hands. Now that our feet are where our hands used to be, and our hands where our feet used to be, would we be free to wander about in public in our bare feet because they are now situated at the ends of our wrists instead of being banished to the ends of our ankles. You know what realtors always say about location, location, location! Our hands would now take the brunt of scrutiny down below. If we didn't put gloves on our hands before hitting the streets to take a walk, would we hands-down get those python-swallowing-puppies-and-kittens- looks for being out in public barehanded. It may not really matter what our feet look like: how they are shaped, what color they are, or how cartoonish they look. When baring our feet in public it might all just come down to location, location, location!