Squirrel and Rabbit Buy Shoes

By Peter Bowden


In the bright gold of morning, Rabbit declared, “We need tennis shoes.” It was not a question, but a thunderbolt, flung from the clouds of his imagination. Squirrel, nibbling toast made from bark and marmalade, nodded thoughtfully. Shoes for running—not from danger, but toward wonder. They set off, past the thistle fields and the mossy stump that sold newspapers, past the corner where yesterday’s stories whispered in the wind. They arrived at the Old Shoe Tree, where shopkeeper Owl wore pince-nez and sold shoes from laces hung on branches.

Rabbit tried on a pair too big, sky-blue with orange tongues that flopped like clown feet. Squirrel found a pair with springs in the soles and declared she could now leap over the moon, but promptly fell into a rain barrel instead. “They don’t fit right,” she sputtered, soaked and proud. Owl frowned and muttered about feet that weren’t feet, paws that didn’t obey rules of heel and arch. Still, Rabbit bought the clown shoes, and Squirrel chose the leapers, convinced they only needed breaking in. “We are athletes now,” Rabbit proclaimed, while Squirrel limped nobly.

They returned home in a slow procession, shoes squeaking, flopping, thumping like an off-kilter parade. Rabbit tripped over his own laces and declared it a triumph of movement. Squirrel, with mud-caked springs and a bruised pride, pronounced the day a lesson in gravity. They placed the shoes by the hearth that night, steaming gently in the warmth, symbols of a dream chased badly and beautifully. And from the dark woods, the trees watched and rustled with laughter, for only fools wore shoes with paws—but what fine fools they were.

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