Wrangler Dani

I hopped out of the car, (Adam’s fantastically bright blue Kia Sportage, lovingly nicknamed “Bonnie” by yours truly,) wet suit still dripping with salt water and grateful for the warm asphalt under my frozen feet.  Adam went looking for my clothes and shoes in the back, but I waved him off.

“I’m on a barefoot kick now,” I announced, and ran up the stairs to a warm bower and a hot shower. (Ha! Did you see that? It rhymes.)

I’ve recently realized that barefoot is so much better than… well… anything.  Growing up in the country and working with horses and construction, I didn’t have a whole lot of opportunities for barefootedness.  Even our water play time was decidedly rough on the tootsies: white-water rafting requires strap-on Chacos or Tevas, which are pretty much the anti-sandal.

But now my feet have all these places to play! Including:

Healthy green grass.

Hot asphalt.

Warm sand.

The warm wooden boards in the steps of the Bower.

Soft carpet, greeting my feet after a long day.

Here’s the thing about going barefoot: it makes me realize that the little, simple things are so much better than what I often strive for.   I think I’m going to implement my barefoot philosopy into all of life.  We work so hard to get things and keep up with each other – yelling in traffic and buying on credit – but it’s unneccessary and ultimately unsatisfactory.

Last night, Adam and I met at the Bower after work, strapped on our wetsuits and went surfing.  Adam knows what he’s doing, but I am clearly new to this whole gig.  However, I love the ocean and swimming in it has been my favorite things to do since Dad drug me in the water and taught me to not be scared of waves; so this whole “surfing” thing is my latest love.

The surf wasn’t great, and we didn’t do much other than paddle around and try our board at catching a few good ones.  But it was perfect.  I loved every glorious, barefoot minute of it.  These little things are so unassuming. The perfect moments are when you stand up on the board for the first time and promptly fall off, a good snooze in the free hammock (thanks mom and dad!) and star-gazing over homemade pasta.  It’s running barefoot across the sand, reading a good book by candlelight, or making someone smile.

This is Barefoot Living, and I am taking off my shoes and running with it.