[The auction for this Significant Object, with story by Sheila Heti, has ended. Original price: $4. Final price: $77.51.]
I never thought of leaving Cape Cod. I imagined I would live there my entire life long. But then Jack and I busted up — when I finally got the courage to leave — and I thought the smartest thing to do would be to start up a whole new life elsewhere. But where? Where was as beautiful as the Cape?
I figured I’d bring a little reminder of home with me, wherever I ended up, and I looked in newspapers and called people I had known from long ago, trying to figure out where to settle. I ended up in Denver for some reason. Basically, an old friend from grade school encouraged me to come.
I bought the shoe a few days before leaving home, and it came with me in my purse. Now I keep it on the mantle of my white-walled apartment where I placed it after unwrapping it from the kleenex that first night.
But I haven’t settled in here. I long for home; the smell of the sea. Was I wrong to leave? Perhaps I was a coward. If ever that jerk moves out of town, I’ll head back there at once. But I’m afraid of being there in the same city with him. I too much liked sleeping with him every which way. I’d fall right back into his bed, where it was always so good. But there was misery in every other part of our lives together.
When I look at the shoe all I can think of is the glass slipper that finally fit Cinderella’s foot. Cape Cod fit me like no other place in the world, until Jack, that irritating grain of sand; that erotic burr, as I called him to Martha.
For thirty-two years I gazed at that sky, uncomplaining. I gazed at the sea through all different windows; windows in whatever place I’d rented near the shore. In Denver, I have no home among people. I am a stranger to the entire world; to this Denver sky.
The longer I stay here, the more lonesome I become. I really took my life on the Cape for granted. I experienced the beauty of life there without even thinking about it. Who knows? Maybe that is true happiness; to be made happy by something and not even be conscious of how happy it’s making you. Maybe you have to not know it’s acting on you in that way to even feel it in the first place. And you don’t even know you felt it till it’s past.
Sometimes I leave a penny in the shoe, those days when I’m feeling a little better about my life here in Denver; a little less displaced. But those days when my entire soul stretches toward the Cape, I take the penny out and leave it near the shoe. I tell myself, You are the penny, Doreet. You will now forever be at a distance from that really simple thing that held you loosely, but securely, with love.
The significance of this object has been invented by the author; see the project description for details. Click here to receive email updates.
July 29th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
Really like this one. I love the way you incorporated the penny!
August 4th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
Sheila Heti was interviewed about the Cape Cod Shoe in today’s Toronto Globe & Mail:
http://bit.ly/qkCy0
August 5th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
I now own a piece of ebay “history.” A Cape Cod shoe and a penny for your thoughts.
August 6th, 2009 at 9:36 am
TJ, I didn’t think to include the penny when I packaged the shoe just now. Maybe I’ll tape it to the underside of the box?
August 8th, 2009 at 6:30 pm
good job, teejay…didn’t let that little tease bid at the end throw you off…a glass slipper…$4.00…heti concoction…$73.51…a faithful sister to carry out your evil bidding while you’re internet is down…priceless…see you at the lake ; )
August 24th, 2009 at 4:25 am
…the cape cod shoe found a home ; )
October 11th, 2009 at 10:34 am
thank you for writing this about happiness.
Maybe that is true happiness; to be made happy by something and not even be conscious of how happy it’s making you. Maybe you have to not know it’s acting on you in that way to even feel it in the first place. And you don’t even know you felt it till it’s past.