Not quite the same as wearing skirts, but I own a lot of shoes. A few have varying degrees of utility, like my steel toe work boots, my hiking boots, my running shoes, and my all black dress shoes. But the majority are just-for-fun shoes. I am not even going to say how many pairs I own, I'd honestly have to physically count them, there are too many to recall off the top of my head. I've had male friends tease me about this, usually with the ever creative and all so original phrase, "Dude, you sure you're not gay?" And I've had girls take a peak in my closet and exclaim with concern (or jealousy?) that I have even more shoes than they do.

I really love shoes. Before I go out sometimes I try on different ones to see which look best with the outfit I am wearing. I love shoe shopping when I have female friends around to shoe shop with!* Obviously going alone is no fun, and attempting to get a male friend to shoe shop would be an invitation for teasing.

We expect women to be obsessed with shoes and own ridiculous amounts of them, while the norm for males is to own two or three pairs and wear them until they are worn out. There are so many gorgeous options out there! So many colors, so many styles. How can anyone own so few?

*Everywhere else I have ever lived I've made good close female friends. In my current location, even though I have been here almost two years, I've not yet managed to make any genuine female friends. Every time I think I've made a female friend, it doesn't take long before it turns out she is interested in more than friendship, then it becomes a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario. They either end up feeling rejected and never talking to me again, or things start going in that other direction, burn hot, then fizzle fast and we move on. I am still trying to figure out exactly why I have this problem here when it has never been an issue for me before.