The fire in the wood stove and a small oil lamp are enough light to run a brush over the boots I wore today.
This is a pair of casual dress boots. They extend just above the ankle, and have a split reverse welt joining the upper to the insole, midsole, and sole, which makes them wider than sleeker dress boots. They are dark brown, leather lace up boots, with five sets of eyelets and three sets of speed hooks. They are of derby style, meaning the quarters wrap to the front and over the vamp of the shoe to form the sides holding the eyelets. The toe is plain, with no cap or broguing, and the laces are dark brown cotton. In fact the design is quite simple. A plain vamp with two quarters and a single strip protecting the back. A timeless look that is often called a service boot, but would look very familiar to men a hundred years ago.
But what stands out is the leather. These boots are made of Chromexcel (commonly referred to as CXL, both within the tannery and throughout the wider world wherever it is known.) CXL is a proprietary tannage of Horween Leather Company, Chicago, Illinois. It follows a recipe dating back over a century.
CXL is a combination leather, partly vegetable and partly chrome tanned. (Lots of steps and people.) It is “cooked” as they say, and stuffed with a secret blend of oils and waxes, giving it a slightly (faintly) greasy look. They are a “pull up leather” meaning when the leather is stretched it lightens, then returns to normal when released. It is easily scuffed and marred when bumped around, but they are restored pretty easily. Yes, all I need is a good brush for most of the care for these boots.
Which brings me to the moment of sitting in a comfortable chair near a blazing fire in the wood stove as it is driving away the effects of winter. With a horsehair brush pushing the fats and waxes around and bringing a deep glow to the shoes.
Care starts when I take them off my feet. A quick wipe to remove surface dirt and water that I may have encountered, and inserting a pair of cedar shoe trees. The cedar shoe trees do two important things: they absorb the moisture the leather has taken from your feet – a pint a day, I’ve been informed; and they keep the leather shoe from losing its shape. Every pair of leather shoes should have its own pair of cedar shoe trees.
This is just an evening brushing, and I’m not adding any lotions or polishes. I tie the laces in a bow and stuff them into the shoe alongside the tongue to get them out of the way. I then take a horsehair brush and briskly brush the whole of the boot, returning from area to area, toe to heel, and watching the low glow appear in the slightly scuffed and formally dull leather. It couldn’t be called a shine, as that implies a reflective surface like a wax. And it would never polish up to that kind of shine anyway. The nature of this leather is that it won’t accept colored polish and wax. It couldn’t mirror shine if you wanted to. You would never pass muster in uniform on a parade ground. No, it isn’t a shine. It’s a gleam. A glow. It looks like the color is deep, almost like a liquid. And on this deep, dark brown leather it is like looking into a vat of dark chocolate.
Each time I bring a brush to these boots I am surprised anew by the rapid return of their good looks. Even in the low lighting of the fire and lamp, the appearance is unmistakable. The boots look good. Solid, sturdy, and comfortable. And as they serve me year after year, I care for them with the respect they deserve. I even remove the heavy scuffs along the inside of the right heel, where it seems I routinely kick myself with the other foot as I transfer myself in and out of the car, and through doors and halls and aisles and sidewalks and pathways of my environs.
Good boots are more than footwear. They are more than fashion and more than protection from the elements. They are more than a tool used in the functioning of life. Good boots are an ally and a formidable part of mission success. Like a jet returning to the aircraft carrier after a sortie, while the pilot is being fed and rested, the plane is cleaned and examined. Checked out and made ready for the next flight. So too should boots be addressed. The minimum is to wipe them down. Removing the dirt and dust of the world, however light it is, prolongs the life of the boots. Brushing raises the temperature of the leather, and brings that gleam we so enjoy. And on boots made of CXL, the brushing moves those oils and waxes around the leather, and scuffs slowly disappear, as if by magic.
As a rule, I don’t wear any shoes more than two days consecutively. A day of rest is a must. And sitting on the rack, polished and smart looking, they are ready to be deployed the next time they are called into service.
Tomorrow I will wear different shoes. Boots probably, as it is January in Michigan. And those boots will have their own properties and characteristics. But like the boots I am brushing, those too will need some small amount of regular care. Brushing and occasional addition of some leather lotion to rehydrate the skin. It is a skin, we know. A skin that has been tanned for longevity. But like rubbing some lotion into your hands to add moisture, tanned leather needs lotion introduced occasionally too. And some boots are typical dyed leather and need additional cream and sometimes wax polishes to restore color and protect them from the elements.
It is some extra care over what a common man might have. He might come home and kick off his outdoor shoes, shoving them in a closet or onto a tray by the door. The next day he stuffs his feet into them, without even the aid of a shoe horn, and off to the day he goes again. He might repeat this process for a year or less before starting the search for another pair, discouraged by how quickly the last pair wore out. He might have confined his search to the cheapest products he can find, or he might spend a sizable amount to meet the standards needed for his work.
I have worked in hard work environments. Places where safety-toes were required, and where boots would get kicked and soiled, stained and scuffed. Whether it was working at a steel company or walking the steel decks of a freighter or tanker on the high seas, I usually received an allowance every other year for a new pair of boots. Two years is how long we expected them to last. Little did I know in the early days how long a pair could last with some regular attention.
The boots I have now will likely be with me and in my wear rotation for the rest of my life. I have several pairs, roughly divided between summer and winter with some crossover to both. The care of the boots is up to me. And when I eventually wear through the life of the sole, all the boots I own can have their soles replaced for a fraction of the cost of a new pair, and an entire new cycle awaits.
This matters more to me than it did back in my youth. I might have had boots I liked and wanted to keep, and boots I wish I could find the equal to, but boots all went the way of the landfill too soon, and often for lack of good care.
And shoes were all too often cheap, and made of inferior materials. Cemented together in some Chinese factory, designed to cover the feet in a presentable manner for under a hundred bucks. Those shoes wouldn’t last regardless of what care regimen I followed. They would lose their shape, or the lining would wear through, or they would get wet and the cement would fail, leaving an unsightly mess.
But I am getting older. (Like we all are – hopefully.) And now I want shoes that reflect me better. Quality shoes and boots for a quality person. A good man needs good shoes, and life is too short for cheap shoes. And I want shoes that I can keep for a long time. Like how I want to last a long time myself. For this I need care too. So attention to diet, and engaging in exercise are a must, as well as cleaning and resting. There will come a point where I end up in a landfill of sorts. How far away that is depends a great deal on me, saving room in that process for the will of the Fates.
On an evening that a younger me would have spent carousing, I now find joy in caring for the boots that care for me.