Personally, I've really always been a shoe and boot sorta guy; there were many years of my life when I did not own a pair of sneakers
But down here in FtL shoes are heavy and hot (though I wear boots for work), so I've finally broken down and started wearing sneakers about four years ago for the first time since I was a kid. I have two pair of very comfortable but extremely boring New Balance running shoes, one pair in black, one pair in a slightly metallic dull steel gray.
About three years ago I found a pair of Tsubo shoes on clearance that fit me and I just had to have them. They've been long discontinued, but bear a certain family resemblance to these. The soles are practically identical, and the overall shape is similar. Mine are made of a nylon mesh in a mustard color except around the edges near the sole, the toe, and running up the back of the heel, which are olive-green leather. Crossing the vamp laterally are two gray elastic straps sewn across alternating with two that are attached with Velcro and covered with strips of the same olive green leather. The area around the ankle bone dips down almost to the sole. The heel extends up rather high again and is attached to the vamp with an additional strap of the gray elastic.
I think they're fabulosity itself, but once, when I wore them on a "date", the young man I was with made a rather snarky comment about trying to impress him "with those $300 shoes".
