All For a Pair of Alligator Shoes

This is my mom in 1957. Isn't she pretty? I love the pictures of her growing up in Cincinnati because she always looks so glamorous and proper. Her mantra for me growing up was always, "Be a lady!"

So my mom went to college at the University of Cincinnati (Go Bearcats!) and participated in a sorority. Mom majored in education and became a school teacher. (She's a nurse now, but that's another story.) She had a friend and sorority sister that she was very close to. They would hang out, wash their hair (I dunno...isn't that what girls did back in the 60's?), play pranks on their fraternity boyfriends, go shopping. They were really besties, I think.

On a particular shopping trip with her bestie, my mom found the most fabulously delicious pair of alligator pumps and matching handbag. Gorgeous. Fabulous. She was in love with these shoes. She had to have them. But, being that she came from her family, there wasn't a ton of money to throw around for a 19 year old to have a pair of alligator shoes and matching handbag. Her bestie, sensing my mom's adoration for these items suggested that they charge the purchase on her family's charge card at this department store. Then, my grandparents could just pay her family back.

Dilemma! Oh, Mom loved those shoes. She loved that handbag. She wanted for those items so desperately, she NEEDED them.

And, so my mom walked away with the most fabulously delicious pair of alligator pumps and handbag.

Her parents received the bill. They were not pleased. I think she was severely punished.


But now I have the most fabulously delicious alligator handbag. Thanks for being a pioneer, MOM! (I wonder where those shoes ended up...)

xoxo