Passing on the High Heels

It's a mainstay of Dos and Don'ts pages in women's magazines everywhere - the photo of the downtown worker in suit and tennis shoes, usually with a black bar across her eyes and some sort of horrified exclamation underneath her picture.

But recently a writer to a women's magazine - might have been Glamour, I'm not sure - brought up a good point. Why, exactly, is this a Don't?

Oh, sure, it's not a look. I get that. But that writer said these same magazines encourage women to use public transportation to be environmentally friendly. She said these women are probably taking the bus or subway in to town, and have to walk a long way from that station to their offices. So of course, any smart woman is going to do that walk in comfortable shoes, not three-inch Christian Louboutins. Besides, you can't tell me you get as quick or smooth a stride in heels as you will in a pair of Nikes.

Here's the other point. These same magazines talk extensively about squeezing in exercise wherever you can. Ten minutes at a time is just as good as doing it all at once, they always say. Who's to say that these women, like many I see every day, aren't squeezing in a brisk ten minutes on the way to work and ten on the way back to the subway at night? Or how about taking that walk at lunch? They may be fitting in that recommended exercise in the way that works best for them, and end up as a Don't in the process.

Well, then, I'm quite happy to be a Don't. I may not look pretty on my lunchtime walk or to and from my car, but it counts toward my exercise goal.