A letter about travelling light

At 68, I packed three pairs of shoes for a two-night visit. My sister asked if I was moving in.

My sister Helen lives a couple of hours south of Perth, and twice a year I go and stay with her for a weekend. We have been doing it for years. Two nights, a bit of shopping, a long lunch somewhere nice, and enough cups of tea to solve every problem either of us has had since the last visit.

We are both in our sixties now, and we have become very good at enjoying ordinary things.

But when she saw what I had brought for our last weekend together, she nearly fell over laughing.

Three pairs of shoes.

Not three outfits. Three separate pairs of shoes for two nights away.

There were the sandals I wore for travelling, another pair for walking around town, and a third pair I thought might be suitable if we went somewhere nice for lunch.

Helen looked at the collection beside her spare-room bed and asked whether I was staying for the month.

I told her I liked to be prepared.

She picked up the smallest pair and asked what exactly I was preparing for.

And the annoying thing was, I didn't have a very good answer.

I wasn't packing for three different occasions. I was packing three pairs of shoes because I didn't trust any one pair to get me through the whole weekend.

I didn't realise how much effort I had started putting into something as simple as footwear until I saw it laid out in someone else's spare room.

Perhaps you know what I mean.

At 68, I don't want to spend half an hour deciding which shoes will get me through a perfectly ordinary afternoon.

I want to put a pair on, go out and enjoy myself.

How I ended up packing shoes for every possibility

It didn't happen overnight.

When I was younger, I could take one pair of sandals away for a weekend and think nothing of it. I wore them shopping, to lunch and out in the garden. If they got dusty, I wiped them clean.

Then, gradually, I became more particular about what I put on my feet.

I had one pair that looked lovely with a dress but wasn't my first choice for walking around town. Another was perfectly fine for the supermarket but looked rather ordinary with something nice. And I had an old comfortable pair that I wouldn't dream of wearing to a restaurant.

So I started taking all three.

It seemed sensible at the time.

But the more shoes I accumulated, the more I found myself changing them.

Before leaving the house. Before lunch. After lunch. Sometimes halfway through an afternoon if the first pair wasn't working out.

My overnight bag became heavier, but I didn't enjoy the weekends any more than I had before.

And I began to suspect that I had been approaching the whole thing backwards.

What my sister said that I couldn't forget

On the Saturday morning, Helen and I were sitting at her kitchen table planning our day.

She wanted to visit a little shop she'd found, pick up some flowers and have lunch by the water.

I was wondering whether to wear the practical sandals and take the nicer pair in a bag.

Helen watched me going through this performance for a minute and then said something rather obvious.

“Maggie, why don't you just find one pair that does both?”

I explained that I had been looking for exactly that for years.

She said perhaps I was looking for the wrong things.

And when I thought about it, she had a point.

I was buying shoes based on how they looked in a photograph, or how they felt for thirty seconds in a shop.

I wasn't thinking about the things I actually did in them.

Getting in and out of the car. Walking through the markets. Sitting somewhere lovely for lunch. Wandering around somebody's garden. Going to the chemist on the way home.

None of those activities required three different pairs of shoes.

They just required one sensible pair I liked wearing.

The blue sandals I almost overlooked

A few days after I got home, I started looking again.

This time I made myself a little promise. I wasn't going to buy another pair simply because it looked good on its own.

I wanted something I could imagine wearing for a whole ordinary weekend.

That was how I came across the Selina sandals at Perth Boutique.

The first thing I noticed was the blue.

It's a soft, muted blue, almost blue-grey in certain light, rather than the bright royal blue I normally see in summer shoes.

There is a warm tan footbed underneath it and a low brown sole, which gives the whole sandal a softer appearance than a solid dark shoe.

It reminded me of faded denim.

And because I own more denim and navy trousers than I care to admit, that seemed like a promising start.

I kept going back to the photograph.

Not because the sandals were especially glamorous. They weren't trying to be.

They just looked like the sort of shoes I would actually wear.

And after years of buying shoes for particular occasions, that felt like the more useful way to choose.

The detail I had been missing

I've learned that when buying sandals, there are certain things I should look at before anything else.

The first is how they fasten.

The Selina has two separate adjustable hook-and-loop closures. One sits across the front of the foot and the other higher up, allowing you to adjust the fit in two different places.

I'd spent years buying buckled sandals where one hole felt too tight and the next felt too loose.

The idea of closing the strap where it suited my foot, rather than where somebody had punched a hole, appealed to me enormously.

There's also a strap around the back of the heel, which is something I prefer in everyday sandals. I don't particularly enjoy footwear that feels as though it's trying to escape every time I take a step.

The open toe, broad straps and gently shaped footbed also caught my eye.

I wasn't expecting miracles from a pair of sandals.

I simply wanted a practical design that didn't make getting dressed more complicated than it needed to be.

What happened when I started wearing them

The first morning I tried putting an outfit together around the blue Selinas, I wore my ordinary cream trousers and a pale striped shirt.

Nothing special.

They looked perfectly at home together.

Then I tried them with jeans.

Then my navy linen dress.

And then, because I was curious, the cotton skirt I normally save for warm afternoons.

By the fourth outfit, I realised I was doing exactly what Helen had suggested.

Finding one pair that worked with the things I already wore, rather than buying different shoes for every possible occasion.

I left them on the hallway table for a while, near the bowl where I keep my keys, and every time I walked past I found myself thinking of another outfit they'd go with.

What appealed to me most was that the colour didn't demand attention.

Blue with denim, blue with white, blue with cream. It was all rather easy.

I was starting to see why I'd been making such heavy weather of choosing shoes for so long.

The weekend test

The next time I visited Helen, I decided to do something different.

I took the blue sandals.

And I didn't pack another pair just in case.

That was the whole experiment.

We went out on Saturday morning to buy a few things for her garden, wandered into a little homewares shop and stopped somewhere for lunch.

It was spring, the sort of day when you take a cardigan because you might need it in the morning and end up carrying it by lunchtime.

I wore my blue sandals with light trousers and a loose blouse.

They looked right for the shops and just as right when we sat down for lunch.

I could adjust the straps to suit my feet, and I liked not having to think about changing shoes every time our plans changed.

Helen noticed the smaller overnight bag before she noticed the sandals.

“You've travelled light for once,” she said.

I told her I was taking her advice.

She looked rather pleased with herself, which is something sisters enjoy doing.

I wouldn't pretend the shoes were responsible for a wonderful weekend.

Helen and I always have a lovely time together.

But it was nice not to have a small footwear problem to solve every few hours.

That was really all I had wanted.

Three things I've learned about packing after 65

One. Versatility is more useful than having a shoe for every outfit. When a pair works with most of the things you already own, you spend less time getting ready and less space in your bag carrying alternatives.

Two. The small practical details matter. I now look for straps that adjust, a back fastening that helps the sandal stay in place and a shape that suits the everyday things I do. Those are worth considering before deciding on a colour.

Three. Comfort and looking presentable need not be separate categories. I used to think there were shoes for walking and shoes for going somewhere nice. Now I look for something simple enough to do both, provided the fit is right.

None of these things is particularly revolutionary.

But it's surprising how long you can go without questioning habits you've had for years.

Why I chose blue instead of black

I nearly ordered the black pair.

That would have been typical of me. Black is sensible, goes with everything and never needs explaining.

But the blue felt just as practical for my wardrobe, with a little more softness to it.

Against the tan footbed, it has a relaxed look that I particularly like with linen and denim.

And, rather unexpectedly, it also goes with several of my favourite scarves.

Helen thinks this is very funny because I've spent years telling her I don't care whether my shoes match my scarf.

Perhaps I care a little more than I admitted.

There's nothing wrong with that.

About the price

I want to mention the price properly because it was something I looked at before deciding.

Perth Boutique currently lists the Selina sandals for $64.99 AUD, with a displayed comparison price of $218.00.

That's a considerable advertised reduction, so I would always encourage you to check the product page and make your own decision rather than ordering simply because something is on sale.

The store lists free shipping within Australia and a 30-day money-back guarantee.

The available sizes run from AU 3.5 through AU 9, and there is a foot-length chart in centimetres to help you select the right size.

That last part matters. Even a sandal with adjustable straps needs to be the right length for your foot.

I would measure before ordering rather than relying entirely on the size I bought ten years ago.

For me, the appeal is in the combination: an understated blue colour, separate adjustable straps, a back heel strap and a simple style that can work with different outfits.

It's worth looking at the details and deciding whether those are the features you want too.

What I would tell you if we were friends

If you and I were sitting together with a cup of tea and you told me you had a cupboard full of shoes but still never seemed to have the right pair when you wanted to go somewhere, I'd understand completely.

I was doing exactly the same thing.

I had walking shoes, shopping shoes, lunch shoes and shoes that were supposedly comfortable but never seemed to be the ones I reached for.

What I needed wasn't necessarily another pair.

I needed to be a little more thoughtful about the next pair I chose.

Something that suited my actual wardrobe. Something with adjustable fastenings. Something I wouldn't feel obliged to change when our Saturday plans went from a garden centre to a café.

The Selina in blue is worth a look if that's the kind of sandal you're searching for.

Study the photographs, check the measurements and see whether the fastening design would suit your feet.

Because at this age, I think we've earned the right to make a few everyday things simpler.

We have enough to think about without packing three pairs of shoes for a two-night visit to our sister.

The best thing I brought home from that weekend wasn't another shopping bag. It was the idea that one good choice might be better than three compromises.

Maggie