Locally, I go in grocery stores and a few restaurants barefoot,
because I know it isn't a problem. I'll take my sandals or slippers
for the mall or other department stores, only because it is a
balancing act between the health of my feet and my overall health,
which is greatly affected by the stress of being harassed. I can live
with occassional harassment, but it isn't worth it everytime I want
to do business someplace.

I continue to go barefoot in many local stores, which do not have a
reputation for harassing barefooters, and where I've tested
the "water" during my more adventurous and experimental barefoot
period (I was barefoot, 24/7 during the entire year of 2000, as well
as several months before and after).

I do not regularly patronize food stores or restaurants that claim
state law requires customers to wear shoes. The funny thing about
wearing shoes or going barefoot where food is served, is that, first
of all, shoes are at least as dirty as feet, and shoes actually help
make and keep feet dirty and fungusy. Secondly, it shouldn't make any
difference whether we wear dirty shoes, clean feet, clean shoes, or
dirty feet, where food is served, as long as we don't dance on the
dishes, and the employees don't scrape our food off the floor.
Thirdly, it isn't a health department law! The laws are assumed by
many, thanks to signs, "by order of the health department" which are
outright lies! Anyway, I don't really want to eat where the
management doesn't know, understand, and/or lies about, health laws,
and principles of sanitation!

In restaurants, the case, often, is that no one bothers you if you
slip your footwear off under the table - just having the footwear
near your feet seems to make management so much more comfortable
about you spending your money there... go figure?

When traveling, I'm usually pretty stressed out anyway, and
especially if I'm traveling to run a marathon, I don't need
additional stress in the days leading up to the event. So, unless I'm
with other local barefooters who have tested the local "waters", I'll
minimize my stress by wearing sandals or slippers in stores and
restaurants.

For me, it is usually a balance between the stress of wearing
sandals/slippers, and the stress of being confronted with the all-too-
common predjudice against bare human feet. While I may be
uncomfortable in footwear for the few minutes it takes to conduct my
business, that discomfort goes away after I remove my footwear. Once
I've been harassed, and that harassment can be very hateful, and
threatening, that harassment stays in my head for the rest of the
day, and sometimes much longer.

I do not believe it is "RIGHT" that some folks mess with our head in
this way, lieing about laws that do not exist to manipulate us to do
stuff that we believe is not healthy for our feet, simply because
they, and/or some of their customers are confused about the sanitary
value of shoes.

I do believe in standing up for my "RIGHTS".

But I also do not believe it is right for folks to shoot bullets in
my direction. Nevertheless, I'm not going to assert my "RIGHTS", by,
knowingly, walking in front of someone firing bullets at people!

Likewise, I will avoid unnecessarily stressful situations MOST of the
time. But, occassionally, it is necessary to put ourselves into
stressful situations, both so that we can grow as individuals, and to
help inform others.

In one such case, the manager of a store near Boston, a few of us
barefooters were told we needed shoes, and we pointed out that it
wasn't a law, and the manager said, "Then who cares?" and left us
alone.

Have fun,
-barefoot ken bob



--- In RunningBarefoot@yahoogroups.com, "mizzzkittykat"
<ex.e_ge_ses@...> wrote:
>
> I never get looks, but am usually barefoot in public places such as
parks, beach (running in
> the sand is a new love), or Hudson walkway.
>
> Drawing the line is tough. I wouldn't enter an establishment where
food was served, nor
> would I demand service from an establishment that clearly states
shoes are mandatory.
>
> --- In RunningBarefoot@yahoogroups.com, "Nate Polaske"
<tiggermaxcocoa@> wrote:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I've read multiple cases from some of you about going barefoot
during
> > your everyday lives and getting griped at. Specifically though,
where
> > do you draw the line? Do any of you go to the mall barefoot?
Grocery
> > stores? Restaurants? Other stores?
> >
> > --Nate
> >
>