One Day Without Shoes

I notice shoes.

Maybe it's because when we first arrived in New York, times were tough and Ma used to cut a slit in the toe box of my sneakers when they got tight. That way, I could wear them for a few more weeks before having to buy new ones.

Or maybe it's because of Baba's stories about walking barefoot for miles to his village school in Bengal. "One pair of shoes," he told us. "That's all I had. I didn't want to ruin them in the mud."

Across the globe, shoes represent wealth, privilege, status,