What's Up, Chuck?

Being the recipient of an unexpected and anonymous gift has to be one of the nicest and most heartwarming feelings one can ever have. From the initial “what’s all this, then?” as you notice the box propped up against your door, to the sheepish apologies to the bomb squad for making them get all geared up for no reason, to the full realization of what someone has done, purely out of kindness, it’s just one big ole bitchin-ass warm fuzzy. (And if the gift is a heated velvet back-pad, it’s literally a warm fuzzy.)

And so it was on Christmas a couple of years ago that I became the proud wearer of a pair of Chicago Bears Themed Converse Chuck Taylor Low Top tennis shoes. These were not some off-the-shelf item that could be picked up on a whim … one doesn’t just walk in to some Chuck Stop and say “yo, size 10 lows in the Bear themeway…”. No, these were honest-to-apricots custom special orders. And there they were, leaning against my door on a cold December morn, a cold morn suddenly made much warmer by the unfathomable kindness of a nameless Christmas angel.

The normal lifespan of a pair of Chucks subjected to protecting my feet is about a year, if even that. I’m a pronator, or supinator, or something. Maybe it’s the stupid way I dance. In any case, they generally don’t survive a long time.

The Chicago Bears Themed Converse Chuck Taylor Low Tops lasted almost 2 ½ years. That’s simply not possible given our current canvas technology … I’m not a religious person, but I really think I have a truer understanding of how the Jews feel about Passover now.

But alas, for even the noblest of lions, winter must one day come, and as hard as it was, I recently accepted that it was finally their time. We’d been through a lot together, some times rougher than others, as evidenced by their condition:

Above: Identical model worn by the Galloping Ghost (Harold “Red” Grange) when he played for the Bears in the 1920s.

I’ve since gone and bought some new black low tops, and there’s really no point of posting a picture of them. They’ll last a year, then I’ll get another pair, then another, and the cycle will continue. But I’ll always remember the Chicago Bears Themed Converse Chuck Taylor Low Tops, and in the Tennis Shoe Hall Of Fame that I curate in my heart, they’ll go right next to the red high tops I was wearing when Sally Mae Shinnemaker took me behind the wellhouse in junior high school.

A sincere Thank You to my anonymous friend.

[UPDATE:] My stupid dog has pointed out that she hasn’t been mentioned in this blog in a while, and hasn’t appeared in a picture for even longer, so here she is modeling one of the new shoes. There, hell-hound, are you happy?

Above: For the life of me, I really can’t figure out why she bites me so much.

She also wanted the family portrait posted:

Above: (Clockwise from right) The Live Acorn, The Dead Acorn, The Monster Of The Midway. It's believed that the non-standard lacing is genetic.

As Dead Acorns go, I'm among the luckier, I think.

[UPDATEx2:] I would be remiss in not mentioning that I received another anonymous gift this past Christmas; an hilarious book published by The Onion, which is some seriously funny stuff, and which is truly treasured. A very sincere Thank You to you as well.