As the school year draws to a close in our region, I reminisce about some of the end-of-school-year traditions. Graduations and the parties with family and friends occur as the seniors look forward to a new chapter in their lives. While many feel apprehensive about leaving old friends behind, others are eager to make new acquaintances and most juggle both feelings. Underclassmen are concerned about missing their older friends and think about the “shoes” they must fill.
This brings me to an odd but longtime tradition of throwing sneakers over utility lines. When I was in high school this tradition was far less expensive since many of us wore $10 or $15 tennies. Most of us had Keds; if you had Converse or Nike that was considered extravagant.
At the end of school it was mandatory that you clean out your lockers, including the one in the gym. After many month’s use, my sneakers could have walked home on their own. I suspect my mother was happy to see them on a wire instead of in the family mudroom. As we disembarked for the last time at the neighborhood bus stop, it wasn’t uncommon to have a time of rivalry when we scrambled around trying to get each others’ sneakers to toss over the highest wire we could manage.
In case you are unfamiliar with the process, it involves stealing your friend’s sneakers and trying to keep your back to the victim while you tie the laces of one shoe to the other. If you’re lucky your friend may have them already lashed together as a pair, and even better tossed precariously over a shoulder. If you got them, you would repeatedly toss one over the wire hoping they would get completely entangled and far out of reach.
I wondered whether this was a regional or national tradition, so I turned to the all-knowing, all-seeing truth and malarkey found on the internet.
I decided to start with the Snopes.com site that tries to sift cyberspace truth from urban legends. Their researcher, Barbara Mikkelson, found there were many explanations given for the abandoned sneaker phenomenon. Her article is entitled “Do Sneakers Hanging from Power Lines Carry a Secret Message?” Some theories dealt with gangs marking boundaries, or losing a life, or crack dealers advertising their presence with “crack tennies,” or boys marking their first sexual triumph, or naturally, markings for low flying aircraft.
The last two reasons offered by Mikkelson seem to fall into line most closely with my experience: “Graduating seniors mark this transition in their lives by leaving something of themselves behind—namely, their shoes. Kids do it just because it’s fun. And besides, what else are you going to do with a worn-out pair of sneakers other than tie the laces together and toss them high?” The sneakers that stayed in your gym locker for a school year are generally worn out and reeking of feet, so giving them a good airing is a quite logical way to dispose of them.
I found a variety of customs related to the throwing of shoes as I went down the internet rabbit hole of information. Army personnel often leave their boots over wires when leaving a post. There is also a ritual of the same when completing basic training, or when retiring from the service. Charles Dickens, in his novel David Copperfield, recorded a Victorian custom of throwing shoes at newlyweds for good luck. On the TV show The Voice, singer-actress Jennifer Hudson throws a shoe at contestants to compliment an outstanding performance. Evidently this is a tradition at dance competitions—or so I’m told.
Conversely, in Arab cultures showing one’s sole is generally an insult, and attacking someone with a shoe is taking it to extremes.
Returning to the end of the school year and the start of summer, a number of locals spend part of their summer at the Jersey Shore, where flip-flops are all you need to cross the hot dry part of a sandy beach—and then it’s time to set the tootsies free.
Let’s face it, shoes are not always necessary apparel in summer. As a teen I normally went barefoot, as did many of my friends. For most of the summer we sailed at Union Lake. Shoes were not needed on a small wet sailboat. By summer’s end my feet were calloused like a pair of tough soles. Most importantly, we were outside enjoying the great out-of-doors.
Over the years I’ve noticed that the westbound side of Route 49 is often littered with footwear by summer’s end. I have my own theories on the presence of these abandoned shoes. I’ve noted that families departing from the Jersey Shore have a ritual of wiping sand from their feet with a beach towel before “loading up.” Folks prop their backs against the car and brush the sand onto the sidewalk, often putting their shoes on the roof’s top behind them. Then they hop in the car forgetting to reclaim their footgear. Shoes only stay perched atop the roof of a moving vehicle for so long and then, voilà, “shoobie litter.”
This begs the question, “How did day trippers to the Jersey Shore become labeled as ‘shoobies’?” The name dates back to the 1800s when folks caught the train to New Jersey beaches from Philadelphia or New York City. Their ticket price included a packed lunch carried in—you guessed it—a shoebox.
This past week, on our morning walk along a dirt road, I found two pairs of high-top sneakers carefully placed by the road’s edge. I suppose these triggered my telling of this story. The sneakers were far from ordinary, at least by my standards. One was covered in glitter with purple ribbon laces, the other had pink reflective trim where the eyelets are grommeted in place, a black toe, and black sides with silver amoeba-like squiggles. Wow, who wanted to abandon these beauties? I’ll spare you my theories and simply say, “I hope you kick off your shoes this summer for a splash into summer and the Great Outdoors.”
Happy Summer!
Appalachian Trail
If you’re thinking about walking the Appalachian Trail this summer you might take part in another shoe-throwing/hanging tradition at the Mountain Crossings at Walasi-Yi Visitors Center, in Blood Mountain, Georgia. This is the southern terminus of the 2,000-mile-long Appalachian Trail, which begins in Mount Katahdin in Maine. The location inspires celebration for walkers who have completed the long trek. Here they toss their hiking boots into a tree at the 1930s stone visitors’ center. For those who travel from south to north the Visitors center is a place to get provisions for the journey.
