Croc love..

You know those rubber shoes, the ones you can purchase in almost ANY colour you could ever wish for.  Found in shops near most British sea side resorts, Clarks and the pound shop in town (although these are not usually Crocs ™ but “crocs”)

Rubbery, holey, orthopaedic, brash but dreamingly comfortable. I didn’t own a pair until a trip to Costa Rica where EVERYONE on the trip was wearing them and I felt a little left out. It all started with the cool bloke I was sat next to on the plane. I bought some Costa Rican equivalent in bright pink that did nothing for my swollen feet on the flight home. Rather than swell IN them, they swelled OVER them.. not nice when trying hard to impress the cool bloke!!

I binned them and bought a proper pair of purple crocs when I moved in with the cool bloke (he obviously didn’t mind my swollen feet!) Schlepping up to London to the proper croc shop in Carnaby Street, I accessorised them with a purple flower to go in one of the holes, but which hole.. there are so many? If in doubt, cool bloke said, always go left. Done.

That was nearly 3 years ago. The flower now gone but the crocs still there, in all their purple glory. They have done more than protect my feet these crocs. They seem to represent my life as it is right now. Sat in a beautiful flat in Aldeburgh, this being cool blokes parents holiday flat, done up like a hotel just without the turn-down and chocolates on the pillows (who needs that anyway..load of tosh). This is our first “summer” holiday together with 16.5 month old female equivalent of cool bloke….cool kid! The weather has been AMAZING. We came prepared for horizontal wind and rain and we didn’t care. This was our holiday together, but better pack the crocs. The flat has an amazing sea view. The sun comes shining in first thing in the morning, being easterly facing and all. You can hear people walking on the pebbles. Not an easy thing to do with flip flops on…

Crocs, I think, also represent the typical British beach. If someone had shown me a pair of these squeaky rubber weird-ass looking shoes while I was laying on a beach in Sydney, Australia, I would have made a "what-the" face. Who needs them when all there is, is sand, sunshine, sea, sunbathing and these rubber thongs (just like to point out here, thong is aussie talk for FLIP FLOP not some elaborate rubber g-string that they all wear on the beach…although some do!)

But back here in blightly in September during the much talked about Indian Summer we crunched our way over the pebbles on our way to the sea. All in our crocs, for our evening passeggiata, me purple, cool bloke army green, cool kid red, I came to realise that being on a british beach with the pebbles is far more interesting than the soft sands of Australia.

On the beach at Manly or Freshwater it was about looking cool, getting a tan, trying not to die in the surf and being 14,000 miles away from all my family. Always with that niggly feeling of being quite lonely in the sunshine.

Where as, on this beach in Aldeburgh in Suffolk I have everything I could ever need and want. The weather is cool, the sunset is beautiful, the stones actually quite satisifying under my crocs. Content in the knowledge my parents and siblings and grandparents are only 3.5 hours away, with mum coming to join us here for the Food Festival at the weekend.

With my very own little family of love, happiness, fullfilment, and of course crocs, to help us all stumble over the stones to paddle in the sea at sunset.