Something as simple as observing someone put a new sole on an old boot can spark a conversation about the complexities of the modern world while providing an entertaining lesson on how things were and, very rarely still, are repaired by hand and machine. “It’s a dying art,” the Boot Doctor said as he looked around his leather shop, filled with neat rows of cowboy boots beat up from years of stomping through the elements, new and used chaps custom tailored to suit different styles of riding, scraps of leather and hide for a knife sheath or microphone holster, and rows of ornate saddles that seem mystifyingly intricate, with their flower reliefs, bands, buckles, and stirrups.
Walking around the shop, looking at all the tools big and small, I wondered what their individual purposes were, how they were held and operated. A pair of colorful cowboy boots, well broken-in, stood vividly on a bench awaiting its new pair of soles. After the bottoms of the boots were brushed with some adhesive, a piece of thick leather in the shape of an oversized boot sole was adhered to the boot and squeezed in a couple of key places with some special pliers. After that, the overlapping sole was guided into a little notched cutting wheel, which rolled around the sole of the boot, silently slicing off the excess leather like scissors through a sheet of paper. It reminded me of a skilled cook who lets his knife do the work for him. In untrained hands, the cutting wheel or the chef’s knife could just as easily mangle a project or a fingertip.
While watching a pair of boots get a second life, I couldn’t help but think about the disposable society that we live in today. Today, it’s often more economical to throw something in the garbage if it’s worn out and replace it with something new. There is something gratifying about buying a pair of brand-new shoes and wearing them for first time, but could you imagine buying a new pair that was already broken in for you? I tried on a brand-new cowboy boot at the shop, something I had never done before. The boot was pretty stiff, and I could see myself suffering through a few blisters before the leather would finally give in. I thought about those blue boots with the fresh new soles, and how their owner would think and feel when he put them on again for the first time. I could imagine a pair of boots that was even better than when they first emerged from their box.
While the art of shoe repair and leather work may be a lost one nowadays, it reminds me that the way of life for folks who ride in the saddles and work in the cowboy boots is much less common than it used to be, too. I could start babbling about such ideas as tradition and quality becoming obsolete due to “progress” and “technology,” but instead I see this as an opportunity to glorify people like the Boot Doctor and the cowboys and the machine makers. As long as these folks continue to make a living by using their unique skills, there is the possibility that other people will take an interest in and learn them. As long as these traditional ways of doing things are alive, we’ll constantly be aware of how much our society has changed, for good and for bad, and will continue to learn how to keep these skills relevant by adapting the things that are so special about them to our modern lives.
[...] The Boot Doctor [...]