Gallus: strap to hold up pants

Galosh: winter footwear

Goulash: church ladies’ noodle concoction

Vowels matter. Shift them a bit to the left or the right and look what happens. But it is neither suspenders nor noodles that I’m concerned about here. It’s galoshes.

Remember when you wore boots OVER your shoes? Or when they were not fashion statements but instead industrial footwear designed to keep you dry and warm?

And remember how you carefully removed them so that your shoes remained inside; catching the lip of the heel with the toe of the other boot or, if you were lucky, with a boot jack? (Does anyone still have one?) Everyone recalls how a perfectly wonderful day could instantly turn to Exasperation City when your shoe came off inside your boot leaving you hopping around ungracefully on the wet floor trying to unwedge it?

There was really no way to elegantly remove galoshes. Bending over and grunting simply didn’t enhance anyone. Unfortunately, it was the only method of getting the job done and bully for you if you could figure out a way of muffling your four-letter grumblings.

Galoshes, or overshoes, had to be sized to our footwear. If they were too big, we clogged around like Big Foot. Too small and it was a mission in senselessness to attempt to get them over our shoes. Boots were expensive so we couldn’t get a new pair every year. Therefore our moms bought them on the big side so we could “grow into them.” That meant that for the first couple of years we had to drag our boots around as we were unable to execute a clean pick-up with each step. It was a clumsy way to grow up.

The only things that held our galoshes on were the buckles. Each boot had at least four sets which when closed created a secure bond. But, then, of course there were always the cavalier boys who didn’t buckle theirs at all. They went around looking like Puss ‘n Boots with their galoshes flaring open at the top. This was the height of clumsiness because it was impossible for them to take a step without falling out of their boots — to say nothing of the slap-clonk-clunk the boot tops made hitting each other. Both amounted to the boys looking even more foolish than they already looked. But, despite being doomed by their own self-imposed image, they spent the winter doing a shuffle-drag-plod with their boots in tow, the single benefit coming out of this nonsense being better defined calf muscles.

Galoshes were heavy. Rubber is. They were made of 100 percent% of the stuff, plus the weight of the buckles. The toes were wide, even bulbous, and the soles were surprisingly not particularly skid proof as the soles did not have deep treads in them. As you can imagine, when you combined cold rubber with slippery ice, they made terrific skis. With their thick, sturdy platform soles there was many a time we skied to school especially if the sidewalks had a decided downward grade to them. Who needed skis when they had galoshes?

The standard galoshes operating procedure was to tuck your pant legs into your boots by folding over the cuffs and carefully inserting your legs into the boots while not letting go of your grip on the folds. This was tricky stuff. If you tucked too ferociously, you couldn’t stand up straight afterward without pulling down on your pants (an uncomfortable and embarrassing predicament) and if you tucked too loosely, you looked like a blousy-pantalooned prince from Baghdad … and what kid from Austin wanted to look like that? No question about it. Folding and inserting was an art.

New kids to the Great North had to learn that pulling your pants down over your boots made about as much sense as pulling your sweater down over your coat. Just didn’t work. But, once you were set with the tuck and buckles in place, you were in like Flynn. You could plow through any snow bank like a Canadian Mounted Policeman and not get snow down your boots.

Once we girls became fashion conscious, we would have nothing to do with the buckles. They were far too manly for our feminine aspirations. We demanded zippers. And that was not all … zippers with some kind of woodland animal’s pelt around the top of each boot. As for putting them on, the same tuck procedure also held true for zippered overshoes.

Galoshes came in brown and black. Pink ones hadn’t yet been invented. In the furthest corner of my memory, however, I do remember that girls’ zippered boots also came in white. In any of you had a pair, please let me know so I can be reassured my memory is not failing me.

Women had fold-over galoshes that had a single elastic loop and button closure. These came in flat, heelless soles or high heel soles with no gradation for the height of the heels. One size fit all heels. They were also of a lighter weight rubber allowing the women to look dainty as they stepped precariously through the drifts. I thought these creations were classy as all get out and could only hope for the day when I could be so blessed as to have a pair of my own.

Of course, skirts and galoshes worked only if the depth of the snow was not over the top of the boots. If such were the case, then pants had to be called into play … snow pants! These were always pulled down over the boots. The truth is that we wore snow pants pretty much every day of the winter because we had to walk so far to school. Kids today don’t know about this because they take warm buses to school.

Sometime when you’re strolling down the halls of AHS, note the size of the lockers. Pretty slim pickings. They’re the same identical lockers we used more than six … seven … eight decades ago! We had to not only stuff our winter coats/jackets in them, but also our hats, mittens, snow pants and big boots. There was little room left for books. Because our clothes were so tightly packed in the lockers, they remained wet throughout the school day making them a pleasant experience to greet us at the end of the day.

If you were in grade school, however, everything was hung in the cloak closet. It was a dismal place — dark, heavy, stuffed to overflowing, damp and smelled like wet goats.  A cloak closet is where we were often sent if we misbehaved. It also had a clandestine side, one that was lustful and romantic. The 4th Grade Sumner cloak closet is where I got my first kiss. It didn’t come from a goat, but rather from the class dreamboat. Swoon …………

Remember how our moms used to bronze our baby shoes? Wonder why no one ever bronzed our galoshes? They would have made terrific umbrella stands.

You can still buy galoshes today, but they’re not the same. Now they’re called fashion boots. They don’t go over your shoes meaning that you have to carry your shoes in a bag or else clomp around all day in big boots. Pesky.

I just had a flashback to the backdoor entries of virtually everyone of my friends’ homes. It was a jumble of wet boots, mittens, jackets, snow pants and hats. Traversing those entries was akin to taking your life in your hands. Much to the mothers’ dismay, the space stayed in puddles for five months out of the year.

Then one day — completely unexpected — the sole of your boot hit pavement. It stopped you dead. Spring was on its way. Galoshes would soon be put away in a far corner of the basement until next fall when your older sister’s boots became yours, yours became your younger sister’s, your younger sister’s became the baby’s … and the cycle continued.
Peggy Keener of Austin is the author of two books: “Potato In A Rice Bowl” and “Wondahful Mammaries.” Peggy Keener invites readers to share their memories with her by emailing maggiemamm16@gmail.com. Memories shared with Keener may be shared or referenced in subsequent editions of “Full Circle.”