As any of you who poke around online have probably noticed by now, tags are a widespread and useful way to organize what you have to say online. Flickr uses them for photographs. Many of the journaling sites use them for online diaries. We use them right here at Shoeblog.

And I use them in my head for my shoes. Maybe this is just another way that I devote an obscenely high degree of time and mental energy toward my shoes, or maybe lots of people do this, but many of the shoes in my collection are accompanied by a mental epithet. These tags often present themselves to me at the time of purchase. Sometimes they’re the reason I want to buy the shoes in the first place.

A few examples of my current “shoe tags.”

The TKO:

These are my Ecco boots, lovingly purchased in the Copenhagen airport before the “boxer boot” style showed up in the USA. Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, indeed.

The Dorothy Gale:

In The Wizard of Oz movie, Dorothy’s slippers are ruby red, but in the book, they’re silver. And at the end of every night I wear these NaNa flats out, I find myself half believing that if I just click my heels together three times, they’ll let me bypass mass transit and magically take me right home.

The Summer of Love:

If I were going to San Francisco, I’d be sure to wear some flowers in my hair and these Zeeta clunky (and super comfy) wedges.

The Oscar Wilde:

Anytime my inner Victorian lady wants out, these Giraudon boots are the go-to choice.  After all, “To me, Beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances.”

The Peter Pan:

If I’m just not feeling like growing up, I pull out these cuffed boots (also by Giraudon). Second to the right, and straight on till morning!

and the newest “tagged” shoe in my closet…

The Pocahontas:

I won’t be able to run through the woods in these until the weather gets warmer (and who are we kidding, I’ll be doing no running at all in these, and they’re much to pretty to get anywhere near the muddy springtime woods), but they’re sitting at home waiting for the spring and my chance to get back in touch with nature.