The Meaning of Love (a story of smelly shoes)

When we were by the Achensee, I “swam” every day. In fact, we never made it back to the campground before the sun had disappeared behind the mountains. The lake, cool and inviting during the heat of the day, became a bit of a colder proposition when the sun was gone. But I’m a jump-in-cold-water kind of woman, and I went in every day. The water level is down everywhere, and it was necessary to keep my Teva sandals on and walk a crumbly bit of rocky wall down to the water, as bare feet would have hurt a lot.

The last time I went down, I slipped a bit and I went in the water with my sandals. After that, the shoes smelled. Terribly.

When I had the food poisoning a few days later, I was almost sure that I’d just become sick from smelling my own shoes.

It was terrible. I tried “borrowing” the hand disinfectant from the youth hostel and dousing them. Then they smelled just as bad, but with a chemical addition to the aroma. It was rainy, so leaving them out in the sun wasn’t an option. I started not feeling well, so I bought some bicarbonate of soda for my stomach and then thought, hmmmm, that might also be good for my shoes! So I doused my shoes in bicarbonate of soda and kept them in a bag for a few days. They were better, but still not great.

And here is where my partner gives proof of true love: he microwaved my smelly sandals. Then he put them out where they could sit in the sun all day.

But man, did you catch that? My partner loves me so much he would microwave my shoes!

I’m still not sure if I want those shoes anywhere near my feet any time soon. I’m almost over the food poisoning but I don’t want to tempt fate. My sense of smell is still a bit over-sensitive. The shoes are better, but not perfect. Maybe another day or so in the sun will do it.