The Princes and the Pea

It is aggravating, uncomfortable and sometimes painful. You are walking along and it happens without warning. You have picked up something in your shoe! With each succeeding step of the inflicted foot, its presence becomes all the more pronounced.
Have you ever noticed that the discovery of such foreign objects almost always happens at inopportune times? Either your hands are full or you are in a place where it is impractical to rectify the malady.
Such was the case for me this morning. I was lugging some bags of groceries from a supermarket to my truck parked about fifty yards away. I couldn't attend to the matter in the middle of the parking lot. It felt like the object was the size of a pea! Lifting my foot from the ground, I shook it vigorously, hoping to dislodge it. Having failed in that attempt, I limped the remaining distance to the truck.
At the sanctuary of my truck, I finally had the oppurtunity to remove my shoe. Shaking it, tapping it against the door, and inspecting within the shoe with probing fingers, it appeared that I had gotten rid of the object.
Shoe back on, I went about my business. Later, however, I picked up something in the same shoe again, and curiously it felt like it was in the very same spot. At that moment I was in the driveway of a client. Inside the man's house, I again removed my shoe to find this object.
It is amazing to me that an object so small, nearly invisible, can cause so much so much grief inside one's shoe. I could feel nothing inside the shoe. If anything fell out, I couldn't say for sure.
The particular shoes I have been wearing are a knockoff brand of the more expensive Dr. Scholls. These are made by Prince, although that is probably an American name for a product made in China. Hmm, what isn't made in China these days? In any event, at nearly half the price, my Princes are just as comfortable and seem to last as long.
I found myself musing over that old Fairy Tale, The Princess And The Pea. The princess had much difficulty getting to sleep because of a pea under her mattress. Of course in the story, the solution was not to remove the pea, but rather to stack mattress upon mattress.
Well, I wasn't about to insert layer after layer of shoe pads to attack some miniscule piece of debris. While my shoe was off I probed the bottom of my foot to make sure it wasn't something on or in my sock. That's another amazing thing, just how does something get inside a sock?
Later on while I was going about my work, there were three or four more "attacks." It had gotten to the point, that I just simply ignored it. The instances of discomfort were sporadic, which led me to believe the object had been shifting around. This continued throughout the remainder of the day. Twice more I removed the shoe and twice more found nothing.
Finally the work day was over, and once I was settled in my chair at home I began to inspect that bothersome shoe in earnest. I don't know why I didn't look there earlier during all the previous inspections, that time I turned the shoe over. I wonder, can one consider discovering a "dumb moment" an epiphany?
There on the bottom of my right Princes was my pea. It was a tack! All that time, with all that aggravation and discomfort was the result of a tack in the sole of my shoe. It had not been penetrating the inside of the shoe, which explained why I never felt when my fingers were poking around inside there. The weight of my body when I stepped upon that shoe applied enough pressure for me to "get the point."
That Princess and her "battle" with the pea had had a happy ending, and she lived happily ever after. I obviously cannot know how happy I'll be in the future, but for today this tale of The Princes and the pea has a happy ending.

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