High Heels Confidential

 

courtesy - Google images

Think sexy and you think heels. The little black dress, gown that sweeps the red-carpet, sari that shimmers under the arc-lights looks incomplete without a killer pair of high heels. Like Sunny Deol without his dhai kilo ka haath, Baba Ramdev without his beard, Poonam Pandey with clothes, Rahul Gandhi without his dimples….Get the picture?

According to gurus of high fashion, you’re not a high till it’s longer than 4 inches and they are not a killer if they don’t make you wobble on tapered, blade or wedges. Platforms are deemed too comfy to gain admittance in the high heeled hall of fame and it’s a stiletto that’s every woman’s preferred weapon of mass distraction.

Stilettoes are not meant for the faint-hearted. They feel like walking on a seesaw, your toes digging into hell and your heels pointing towards the heavens, begging for deliverance. It gets even better if they are six-inchers. You are constantly oscillating between agony and ecstasy. The feeling that you’re looking like a diva, as you balance your entire body weight on that delicate strappy thing, is even better than chocolate melting in your mouth. But the painful bunions on your feet, the raw cut on your ankle have a different story to tell.

Yet, scores of us are happy to haul ourselves atop needle shaped heels, for the sake of a killer statement.

Slide into a high heeled fantasy and you’ll know why. Your legs transform into poles and your entire anatomy gets a sensuous makeover. Your otherwise hurried steps turn into a lazy trot, your curves acquire a rhythm of their own and you are no longer the harried, multitasking woman on wheels but a Goddess meant to be worshipped. Stilettoes don’t discriminate. For them, it doesn’t matter that you are squat, fat or look like a matchstick; they will still lavish you with love and make you feel like the Diva you are. Hot, smouldering, standing head and shoulders above most, we look confident, feel confident and turn a blind eye to the foolish ones who totter on heels like drunken giraffes.

One of our pet nightmares is toppling on our stilted pumps and falling flat on our face. You swish into a party, looking like a million bucks, the tip of your heel gets stuck in the carpet and as you take the mighty fall, you imagine your terrified mug shot splashed on the front page of your favourite tabloid, the headline screaming – Woman killed by high heels!

Julia Gillard did it, on her visit to India. Lady Gaga did it even better and they both survived to read the morning headlines about their pointless misadventures! Aussie PM’s hilarious face-first tumble as her high heel gets stuck in the grass. Lady GaGa Falls Flat on Her Face, Thanks to Massive Platform Heels. Someone will even manage to shoot your Humpty Dumpty moment and upload it on YouTube. 

 Image courtesy www.thesun.co.uk

Does that mean women who love strutting their stuff on high heels are masochists or even worse; scatterbrains, simply pandering to a male fantasy of a femme fatale? Why would anyone put one self through so much discomfort for the sake of feeling good about looking good!

I think it’s more about the feeling of power it gives you. For us, high heels, a dress that hugs our curves are a symbol of liberation. If I am baring my cleavage, it’s because I get a kick out of flaunting my femininity and not because I’m hungry for attention. And isn’t liberation all about not letting others dictate your choices – be it a choice of career, soulmate or solemates?

Freud even articulated a theory likening the shoe to the vagina. By that logic, the heeled shoe becomes a vagina with penis - a chick with a dick who’s comfortable being a male fantasy and is not afraid to chase men and her ambitions with equal gusto.

Then why judge people on basis of how they look and their choice of attire and footwear. Why expect women who want to be taken seriously, to be grounded in matronly pumps and dress in pillowcases to desex themselves?

Isn’t that falling prey to yet another stereotype? Dressing down to earn the label of a nun and dressing up to be dismissed as a slut! Why should we let our looks get into the way of what we feel about ourselves and how we make others feel?

If Mamata Di decides to forgo her rubber chappals in favour of bright pink wedges and continues to blame everyone but herself for West Bengal’s problems; people will still make fun of her. Or for that matter Arundhati Roy shedding tears for her Maoist brothers in a pair of high heeled boots, will have as much impact.

For me, a woman who makes the pavement a runaway, is not afraid to unleash her oomph in the boardroom, is the ultimate alpha female. She doesn’t mind the gaze that lingers a tad longer on her legs as long as she’s in control of things.

And if things do go out of control, she can simply turn her weapon of distraction to destruction and bring the amorous man to heel!

Ironically, I am out of control in heels. Every time I aspire for a high-heeled existence, I teeter and falter and end up wincing in pain. When I do venture out in dangerously high heels, I hold on to the husband for dear life. And if I am on my own, I make sure there’s a good looking, almost chivalrous man in the vicinity before I fall from grace.