Time to toughen my feet, A month and more with no soles, barefoot shoes
You may recall last summer that I realized I was very much the "tenderfoot" and spent a number of evenings walking barefoot around the neighborhood. I also wore my "pain" shoes poking staples into my sole as I walked. But this summer I had been busy with other things and had only taken a few barefoot walks.
While on a mini-vacation in upstate New York, I hiked to the top of a mountain (only a few hundred feet, there was a road most of the way up, but that few hundred feet was a difficult rocky climb). And there is this husband and wife who hadn't paid attention to the "sturdy footwear recommended" sign and were climbing barefoot. They had both started with flip-flops and discovered they weren't "sturdy". They made it to the top, and that reminded me, I really needed to toughen my soles.
Shortly after I got back, I started wearing my "barefoot" shoes, most often my Asics wrestling shoes which had lost their soles to powder a couple of years ago, but also my older Nike white canvas wrestling shoes which lost their soles years ago, and my Capezio jazz shoes, on which most of the soles wore away, also years ago.
I wore them all day, every day for a month, shopping, to work, on long walks, everywhere. I then took a brief break of a couple of weeks, mostly to be able to photo some of the "new" shoes I had recently acquired. And now, I'm back wearing the barefoot shoes, at least until the weather gets too chilly.
I've made progress, but still need a lot more callus to reach my goal. The "yard" around the building where I work is filled with crushed stone, with sharp edges. When I started this exercise, I couldn't bear to stand barefoot on the stone more than a few seconds, let alone walk on it. I'm now to the point I can actually walk around on it, slowly and not at all comfortably. The sharp edges of the stones still hurt my feet.
My goal is to be able to walk barefoot on those stones without pain, just as I can with shoes on.
Time to toughen my feet, A month and more with no soles, barefoot shoes
You may recall last summer that I realized I was very much the "tenderfoot" and spent a number of evenings walking barefoot around the neighborhood. I also wore my "pain" shoes poking staples into my sole as I walked. But this summer I had been busy with other things and had only taken a few barefoot walks.
While on a mini-vacation in upstate New York, I hiked to the top of a mountain (only a few hundred feet, there was a road most of the way up, but that few hundred feet was a difficult rocky climb). And there is this husband and wife who hadn't paid attention to the "sturdy footwear recommended" sign and were climbing barefoot. They had both started with flip-flops and discovered they weren't "sturdy". They made it to the top, and that reminded me, I really needed to toughen my soles.
Shortly after I got back, I started wearing my "barefoot" shoes, most often my Asics wrestling shoes which had lost their soles to powder a couple of years ago, but also my older Nike white canvas wrestling shoes which lost their soles years ago, and my Capezio jazz shoes, on which most of the soles wore away, also years ago.
I wore them all day, every day for a month, shopping, to work, on long walks, everywhere. I then took a brief break of a couple of weeks, mostly to be able to photo some of the "new" shoes I had recently acquired. And now, I'm back wearing the barefoot shoes, at least until the weather gets too chilly.
I've made progress, but still need a lot more callus to reach my goal. The "yard" around the building where I work is filled with crushed stone, with sharp edges. When I started this exercise, I couldn't bear to stand barefoot on the stone more than a few seconds, let alone walk on it. I'm now to the point I can actually walk around on it, slowly and not at all comfortably. The sharp edges of the stones still hurt my feet.
My goal is to be able to walk barefoot on those stones without pain, just as I can with shoes on.