My Doc Martens

I do not care that they are played. I do not care that no one would be caught dead in them. I don’t care that you can pick up a pair for 35 cents at any Goodwill across the country.

I love my DMs.

I have a pair of low quarter DMs that I bought in Berlin, Germany in 1989. Here they are:



I have them still.

They long ago molded to me feet perfectly. They took their shape in the clubs of Berlin and Amsterdam, Paris and Barcelona to the sound of FRONT 242 and Nitzer Ebb. They held firm to the metal floor of the Linientreu club on Budapester Straße just next to the Berlin Zoologischer Garten. They walked the countries of Europe and have known soviet soil. They were with me when I got mugged in Amsterdam on my twenty first birthday, falling down drunk in the red-light district. They remember the gay and lesbian clubs of Europe where beautiful young people enjoyed being beautiful young people.

They are my youth.

I love them dearly.