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What in the world would Olive Oil have in common with SHOES???? The two together sounds like the beginning of the end of the shoes and a grand mess to clean.
We had an interesting breakfast with a bed & breakfast guest sitting on the side sofa in the dining room, joining the conversation and cleaning his shoes!!!
Using normal kinds of shoe cleaning materials that could have been a smelly mess and interfere with breakfast, causing smells that would make most of us stop eating and leave the table. This guest, however, came down for breakfast and asked if we had a bit of Olive Oil that he could have in a small saucer or cup or any kind of container.
We thought he was going to use the Olive Oil on his eggs or maybe he didn’t want butter on his toast and was going to use the Olive Oil on his toast so we gave him a saucer and put the bottle of Olive Oil on the table in case any other guest wanted to do the same.
This guest had a small rag with him which he dipped into the Olive Oil which he had poured into his saucer and sat on the side sofa and began to wipe his shoes all over with the rag full of Olive Oil. Imagine the surprise around the table! He very nonchalantly joined the conversation, which came to a halt when folks saw what he was doing. He spent a little bit of time carefully wiping his shoes all over with the rag and at the end took his shoes into the bathroom and rinsed off the soles of his shoes. Wow! The only thing the rest of us had ever done was to take off our shoes and, if we weren’t too tired, put them in the closet.
His shoes looked spectacular. He took them to his room and came back to join the group for breakfast. The questions were all waiting for him. Was he going to wear them that morning? Wasn’t he afraid the Olive Oil would ruin the leather? Why did he do this to his shoes? Didn’t he use regular shoe polish to take care of what looked like very expensive shoes.
He said his mother made him do this when he was a kid growing up. Every night before going to bed he had to clean and polish the shoes he had worn that day. He rubbed them all over with Olive Oil – taking off any dust, etc. which might have collected during the day and would carefully rinse off the soles of his shoes so he didn’t keep in the house any debris tracked in from outside. He didn’t want that kind of ‘dirt’ in his closet. He then put his shoes in his closet overnight and let the Olive Oil soak in. He didn’t wear his shoes out immediately when he cleaned them with Olive Oil, he wanted them to dry first, but he didn’t have Olive Oil with him and since he arrived late at night, didn’t want to bother anyone so he waited until morning to clean his shoes. The airlines wouldn’t let him keep his little bottle of Olive Oil, so he had to give it up before boarding the plane.
Well, you can imagine what followed. All but one of us poured Olive Oil into our coffee cups’ saucer and tried rubbing it on our shoes. The results were great! It was a hilarious time and I was converted. I have continued to use Olive Oil on my shoes and I have not been someone who cleans their shoes after each use -not even during a long shoe-lifetime of wearing. When the shoes get too dirty – out they go into the trash. Now, I will probably have shoes lasting close to forever from what I’ve experienced as a result of cleaning my shoes daily with Olive Oil. The first time I tried this I put the shoes in the closet and took them out the next day to see the results. I didn’t clean any ‘good’ shoes because I was a skeptic. Wow! Those everyday shoes now look really great – as though I had them professionally shined and all I did was to rub them all over with a little bit of Olive Oil.
His mother trained him well.
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