Shoe Shopping with G-Man. Ugh.

Last week G-Man ran in his very first high school track meet. He tied for last with his teammate in the 100m. He ran his best time and was proud of that. After the race he said,

I don’t want to sound racist but all the kids from the other team were black and… well… they can RUN!

At home that night, G-Man showed me the bottom of his running shoes that had been worn smooth and asked if he could get new shoes and some compression shorts over the weekend. No problem. I told him that we would go to Adidas at the outlet mall. He definitely needed new shoes and I quickly learned that compression shorts are worn under the track shorts to help hold all the important bits in place. Got it.

Shopping with my boys can be hit or miss. Most things they are quite laid back about. But there are certain items in which each of my children has very strong opinions. Plus they each like to stick with their own 2-color color scheme. Mr. A is picky about his shorts and his color scheme consists of khaki and grey. G-Man is extremely picky about his shorts AND his shoes and his color scheme consists of blue and white.

I was in such a wonderful mood Saturday morning that I had forgotten about G-Man’s shoe shopping habits. Maybe I should revise my statement. G-Man is picky about his shorts but when it comes to his shoes he knows exactly what he wants but doesn’t always share this information.

When we arrived at the outlet mall, G-Man asked if we could look at Rack Room Shoes instead of Adidas. I said that we would look at Adidas first. Inside the store, he bee-lined for the non-athletic type shoes. I told him no because they weren’t running shoes.

We then proceeded to argue about the fact that they don’t have an arch or any other support.* This argument when on and on while I made G-Man try on every single running shoe in his size and I texted my Sweetie,

The next time this kid needs shoes you are taking him shopping!!!

G-Man found something wrong with every single pair of shoes. I relented and agreed to go to Rack Room.

At Rack Room, he went straight for the Pumas. Once again, the non-athletic type shoes. Finally, I understood that’s what he wanted but he just used the excuse of needing running shoes to get me in a shoe store. Now I was able to handle the situation a little bit better. I told him to select a pair of running shoes FIRST (because he really did need them) and then he could pick out a pair of Pumas if he wanted to spend his own money.

A pair of New Balance was the winner for the running shoes. G-Man even remarked how comfortable they were. Then came the agonizing decision of which pair of Pumas to buy. Personally, I really liked the grey pair. G-Man desperately wanted the white pair (see above reference to blue & white color scheme) but I threw down the Mom Card and nixed that idea. Mostly because they looked so much like the Capezio jazz shoes that everyone wore circa 1983 (and I didn’t even like them back then). We compromised on the black pair.

The store was running a Buy One Get One 50% off sale and G-Man thought that his Pumas would be the 50% off pair. But it didn’t work out that way. The NB pair was on sale already and ended up being the lower priced pair.

All of the shoe shopping aggravation took one and a half hours of G-Man and I butting heads. If only he said,

Hey Mom, do you think that I could please get some new Pumas in addition to my running shoes?

Then I would have known what was going through his head and I wouldn’t have sent any text messages to my husband threatening to leave our youngest child on the side of the highway somewhere.

The rest of our shopping experience was very companionable. G-Man got his compression shorts to keep things snug and some shorts and t-shirts at Quiksilver. I have finally learned what G-Man looks for in a pair of shorts so I know what to expect and it’s rather low stress.

*After he had his Pumas, G-Man admitted that his Vans aren’t comfortable if he has to run, stand or walk for a long period of time. Hmm. Vans don’t have any kind of support. Mom might actually know what she’s talking about.

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Your Turn
Do you have a picky dresser in your family? Do you butt heads when shopping with your children? When you were a child did you ever have arguments with your parents about clothes? Did your parents understand your fashion sense?