QotD: The first time you had your shoes taken off - how surprised were you to see that you still had toes?

When I was very young, I didn’t even know I HAD toes. I simply scrambled upright as soon as I could manage it, wobbled around for a bit, and then took to frolicking outside in the grass as soon as they let me loose. Like many youngsters, I was soon bored, and began to look longingly at the road out front. Ah, to be free to travel, to see where that road would lead!

My wish came at last, but before going into the wide, wonderful world, it seems I had to have shoes. Gag! First came the nail clippers. You can’t blame me for flinching at the sight of THOSE. Then came the whole deal of trying a shoe on, putting it back, trying it on, putting it back—they all looked pretty much the same to me, and I began to think they’d NEVER be done. They weren’t happy until they had a perfect fit.

Perfect fit. Okay, maybe, but do you have any idea how HEAVY those things are? No more skippity-bippity around the grass; just me and my clodhoppers cloppity clopping. Oh, all right—that part was pretty fun once I got used to it. Stamp, stamp, stamp.

After a while, I began to love those shoes. They protected my tender feet and you could sure hear me coming. I liked the different way they sounded when clomping around on dirt, or in the grass, or on gravel, or on cement. Then, just when I realized I loved, loved, loved my shoes, I lost one. Can you believe it? They said I needed new ones anyway.

So they yanked the rest off, and whadya know!? I still had four beautiful toes. (Well, what did you THINK those were?) A little trim, a little fitting, pound, pound, pound, and soon I was prancing around in my brand new shoes, tossing my head, and living up to my name: Black Beauty