Parenting Humble Pie

I once read in one of those funny emails you send to fellow parents about the joy, exasperation and never ending slew of surprises of parenthood that you should get all of the judgement of other people's parenting skills out of your system before you have kids because once you have them you will inevitably fall into the same trap as those you judge. This hit me because I know I have been guilty of this from time to time. Case in point: I always looked down on parents who would carry their children around without shoes in public. I considered it a sure sign of neglectful parenting verging on trashiness. I will NEVER do this I had convinced myself.

Then along came my beautiful, happy, all around PERFECT son, River. And of course from day one it was obvious that the kid had ginormous feet! And by big I don't mean really long, but wide and thick. You know those cute little tiny shoes you can buy for newborns? The ones that are so tiny you can't help but say "Awww" when you look at them? Yeah, those may have fit his feet a month or two prior to his birth while he was still in utero but "out utero" there was no way. Over the winter we relied heavily on socks (generally for ages at least 6 months older than he was) and slippers. But once spring and summer hit is was too hot for either of those and if we even dared try they would promptly be removed somehow by the wearer. We tried sandals because they had more give to accommodate the width of River's feet while providing more air for those little pups to breathe. But again, it was next to impossible to keep them on. He loved to chew on them and they fell off easily even when not provoked. We've tried cute shoes that seem to have flexibility but alas the size we have to buy to accommodate the width and breadth of his foot ends up almost twice the length of his foot making it look like he has clown shoes on. And so, with my head hung in shame I gave up on any form of footwear and let my child go barefoot. At home, at his nanny's and yes, even in public. I learned that day that sometimes, when the weather is appropriate, there are valid reasons why babies must go barefoot even in public. And when they do it is not a sign of neglectful parenting but a sign that, like me, their parents have resigned themselves to the reality that shoes are not always practical.

On occasions when I see "shoed" babies River's age or younger I get that pang of regret that I cannot do the same for my son. But mostly I have grown so accustomed to my nude footed son that I think it is really cute and give fellow parents of barefooted babies an extra big smile because perhaps they are feeling as self concious as I...