Popular

One day I went to the gym and my shoes were missing. Some woman took them home with her because she thought they were her shoes. Although, she wasn’t totally sure, so she left a long flowery note about how she took some shoes and if she took your shoes, you should email her. She ended the letter with her email address and a drawing of a smiling flower.

I found myself standing in the locker room in my workout clothes and socks without my shoes, so I emailed in a huff and demanded she return them ASAP. They were returned the next day with a very apologetic note. Apparently this woman’s sister decided that my shoes were her sister’s shoes because they had mud on them. Huh? How is mud a factor in deciding if a pair of random shoes in a cubby hole at the local YMCA are yours or not…?

So, I promptly put my name on the inside of my shoes and made all the women in the change room were aware of the situation. Bizarre, but apparently it happens.

THEN. I was at the gym a few weeks later. One moment my shoes were there, and then moments later they were not. While I was at the gym, a woman took them right from under my nose! How the heck is a woman supposed to work out if her shoes keep going missing? As of that moment, I was officially upset and unsure about the kind of women that work out at the YMCA. While I got ready for work after not working out because my shoes were MIA once again, I devised a plan. I decided to go out and look at all the women’s feet that were working out and make a scene when I found the perpetrator.

While applying my mascara, I notice one of the women that I run with covertly motioning to me. She quietly let me know that a somewhat confused looking woman just walked in with shoes that looked like mine.

So I staged a confrontation.

I found the woman standing next to the shoe cubby holes looking bewildered. I minced no words and asked her if she was wearing my shoes, and if so, why?

Apparently she was. She couldn’t find her shoes, so she opted to use mine. They looked similar to her shoes and since she didn’t know where hers were, she used mine. WITHOUT SOCKS. The shoes were still warm when she handed them back to me.

My favorite part was the fact that my shoes appeared to be about 3 sizes too large for her. She had to batten those suckers right down to get them to stay on, which resulted in a Ronald McDonald-esque look for her.

I have one question – who are these people and how do they not know what their runners look like??!?!!?

Apparently I have the most popular shoes at the YMCA. I’ve always wanted to be popular, but if this is popularity, I think I’ll pass.