Rivalry in the Afternoon

Joy Boosters in Boots

JOY boosters - Bartie is a fan of the bright new additions.

BY AYESHA JOY CLIFFORD ©

I'VE got big feet! 

Actually, for a lady, they're huge - nudging size 11.5. I've often thought of the Cinderella wannabees trying to squash their feet into dainty slippers.

Perhaps that's why boots have became a staple of my wardrobe.

Long before they were trendy and as a busy journo working in the Beef Capital, I would seek out boots in all shapes, sizes and colours that could comfortably accommodate my good grip on the earth, all day long.

I've had steel caps, gum boots, meatworks ankle whites, platforms, dance boots - an eclectic variety that has taken me from press conferences to dusty military fly-ins, to power stations, kill floors, floods and fancy nights out.

When I worked in Tokyo, my boots announced my origins as much as the Claybourn and blonde hair. They also opened many a conversation that ensured a solo traveller was rarely alone in a foreign country captivated by our wild spaces and wild places, and maybe not a little by our wild people. 

Boots add that something extra that is hard to define. The artistry and expression, the combination of creativity and practicality appeals to me.

When the Amazing Husband and I first began working together on his 24,000 acre property at Marlborough, he proudly presented me with a pair of steel caps.

A couple of months old now and these gumboots are yet to meet mud in the Northern Rivers.

Fast forward to our farm in the Northern Rivers and ankle-gracing boots lose all appeal walking through thick grass with docile red-bellied snakes often a little tardy in getting out of the way. 

Knee-high gum boots have become my farm fashion statement of choice through several years of consecutive flood and wet.

It's dry here now so perhaps it was time for a boot update too - a little joy boost in my day.

The Amazing Husband presented me not with roses on Valentine's Day but with something far more precious - candy-pink boots!

It is dry. We're culling cows. We're calculating herbage mass and DSE in our sleep. These shiny pink beauties are a shot of pure, frivolous joy in my day.

A reminder to daily look for the bright shots of  joy in the dust of life.