I am told by my mother, my SHO, the doctors in the second series of Junior Doctors, and my old psychiatry registrar that it is tradition to buy oneself something nice with one’s first real grown-up paycheque.
My first real grown-up paycheque came this week. I’ve bought myself some council tax. It’s all very surreal. I was a student for a long time. I’m not sure what to do with the sensation of paying for, for example, a train ticket, without having a minor cardiac event during the fifteen seconds it takes the machine to tell me that my debit card hasn’t been declined. I’m even less sure how to convince myself that this money doesn’t represent my entire budget until January. It is probably a reasonable summary of how I feel about this if I tell you that I bought a pair of work shoes today and experienced crippling guilt over how much I paid for them.
These are, I should say, a pair of shoes that I bought to replace this pair of shoes, which I have been walking around in in this condition while I waited to be paid. And when I say “walking”, I mean “squelching”. And when I say “shoes”, I mean something that has long since ceased to have the molecular structure of a shoe.
The soles split just before my first week of long days. I’ve been telling people that NHS corridors have broken my shoes. My consultant has been frowning and muttering dark things about trench foot.
So, despite my crippling guilt, my new pair of work shoes — which are not Manolo Blahniks or Prada or even Clarks — does not count as my something-nice-with-my-first-paycheque. I am given to understand that most girls do go down the designer shoes route, or else the designer handbag or the indecently expensive bottle of champagne or the something shiny from the Apple store route.
I am not most girls. I wouldn’t know a Manolo Blahnik if the heel of one trod through my big toe.
And, as I joyfully explained to the man in the Le Creuset shop, who promptly gave me a discount when he found out what I was doing, I’ve been planning my First Paycheque Handbag-That-Isn’t-A-Handbag for quite some time now.
That is a great idea =] I love the Le Creuset I inherited from my Mum =] Enjoy! xx
It is SO pretty. And I want to cook ALL THE THINGS.
That is excellent
I bought a laptop and paid my rent, if I recall correctly. And a microphone, but that really was not for me.
Ah, rent. Yes. That. It will, like everything else, be a novelty to pay that without wondering if I can then afford to eat this month.
Beth, you are a woman after my own heart. Shoes come and go, but Le Creuset lasts forever.
As is probably obvious, I shouldn’t be trusted with expensive shoes even if they were something I hankered after.
Ooh, good for you. I don’t even have my first Le Creuset yet – but I know very well that I’d far prefer to have a good red stock pot than a pair of shoes!!
It is far more beautiful than any pair of shoes…
And much more useful and long-lasting!
Oh bless him … and VERY pretty
He was lovely, and not remotely fazed when I lined up four casseroles of varying shapes/sizes/colours on top of his cash desk and dithered over them for half an hour.
The first of several Le Creuset? Regardless of fashion I am curious to see the new shoes. Nice feeling to be earning after all this time. Takes me back to October or November 1982 and my first full time pay which was disappointingly small at about £360 and may have been used to buy a shirt for a party.
Gosh. I’ve a feeling that these may be a terrible disappointment after all that.
Shoes.
Even the physiotherapists were surprised enough by the lack of flapping and squelching around the ward that they commented on them today.
Oh, and, yes, you may be right about this not being the last Le Creuset that I’ll own.
Nice. Very pretty.
That was not quite what I had in mind dearest niece, but I will forgive you. As for the shoes, who knows!!!!!!! Perhaps you can buy TWO pairs, just in case. No wonder I love you loads. Auntie J. xx
No, but I asked and you didn’t know what you did have in mind. So.
These are not shoes but little boots. Or am I missing something as a mere male? The Le Creuset may last around 80x as long, and so will be a bargain.
No, they are boots. Technically. My interest in footwear extends to distinguishing between running shoes and other kinds of shoes, and boots are lumped in with “other kinds of shoes”.