Escapes. These used to be my shit, boy, let me tell you. I was looking hard for a pair of these from about late 2002 til sometime last year. Right after i put them on my to cop list, I heard they went on sale in that huge footaction purge. Like dudes I knew had been finding them for $10. In the high tops. I was wearing more high cut sneakers back then, and placed a premium on looking like an asshole (from the ankles down) and these were up there. The red swoosh, as much a part of the colorway as the thick brown leather, was just fly. But every time a pair came on ebay, I balked. there was one guy from the eastern rim that was selling them for $120, and for a college student with a weak canadian dollar, that was a lot of money. Another guy had a revolving door of these old boys for about $60, so i just never bid, copping other things (some sneakers, mostly sundries), until, of course, he ran out.

I was in stocking feet, overseas, one summer, when I had a night job and a possible conflict of interest. One of my internships was for an extremely right wing israeli news agency (I had another one on the opposite side of the political spectrum) and sometime in june 2005, I was to work security at an anti-disengagement fundraising concert in the heart of the west bank. My boss drove us over there in his fiat, me and this russian chick from brooklyn with dreads down to her ass, and we had about half an hour to kill at his house, which was about a block away from the concert. I remembered about halfway to the gigger that I was watching a pair of DS escape highs in my size from a private seller in the US. I had come to the holy land with not nearly enough sneakers and had ordered a couple pairs already, even if no one noticed (I wasnt in Tel Aviv). So I called my sabra uncle, who lived in the US longer than I have, from the fiat and asked him if he could login to my ebay and place a reasonable bid on the Escapes. Unfortunately, he was in the market buying weekend treats, not near a computer. An hour later I was in my boss’ modest house, with a green garden and a fine view, staring at the business end of an early century Dell, looking over my shoulder, thinking long and hard about whether i could take the 30 seconds and commandeer my employer’s personal computer and have my feet quenched after a three year thirst. I instead helped myself to some fresh fruit and went about my business.

I got a pair of these a year later but they were too small, and I eventually sold them, without even wearing them out of the house.

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