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I go barefoot as many places as I can. I haven't worn socks either in years. But i would never walk on public sidewalks barefoot. There is spit, feces, insects rodent droppings, garbage slime, snail tracks, and so on laying on the cement and pavement. Along busy avenue and freeways there is diesel and gasoline fumes that have settled on the walkways. So many things can cause foot infection and track into your home. If you have a cut or scratch on your feet, tetanus infiltrates.
I walk barefoot on my property. Sensitive feet would soon get calloused enough to withstand walking barefoot on surfaces like pebbles and twigs. Gravel maybe not so much.
The thing is, your shoes soon track all that dreck into your house and on your floors anyway. Unless you religiously go without shoes in the house, getting it on your feet or your shoes isn’t a huge difference.
With sensitive feet I didn't enjoy the outdoors barefoot even as a child. Now, at 74, I do usually wear socks indoors, shoes outside, sandals in summer.
As part of the cold season mania, a fun exercise I do once a year is: I wait for it to drop to 20 degrees F, and then I do a quick run around my city block totally barefoot. Shorts & tee shirt as well (but of course). It's about 0.5 miles which takes 3-4 minutes. For the first quarter mile or so, there's a sharp stinging pain in the soles of my feet, then lots of numbness. So much fun though. Not sure what the frostbite threshold for such an endeavor is (probably 0-10 degrees F for healthy people) but at 20 it still felt safe to me, sort of.
Long story short, the answer to the first question in the thread title is an emphatic "no."
Growing up in Florida, I went barefoot a lot, or wore flip flops. Of course, there were school shoes, and church shoes, but otherwise, it was barefoot or flip flops.
But would I/could I do it now? I wouldn't want to. I know that. It would severely impact my life, if I HAD to go barefoot for the rest of it.
Once in awhile, we watch a show called Naked and Afraid. Basically, a man and a woman (strangers to each other) are put in some jungle, or harsh terrain, and they have to survive for 30 days, naked.
And I always think "They could AT LEAST let these people have a pair of flip flops". LOL
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I am barefoot in the house most of the time. I could tolerate being barefoot here about half the year, but in the summer the pavement is much too hot, and the fire ants are uncomfortable too.
In short — no. With diabetes, my feet need to be protected. I wear Haflinger slippers in the house all the time. Outside I wear shoes. Summer I can get away with sandals, but the bottoms of my feet are very very protected.
No, I would not go barefoot. I wear sandals at home when I'm resting, and shoes to go outside. If shoes disappeared suddenly, then I would have to make a way for them to "appear" again. Make my own, or get someone to make some for me. But under no circumstances would I be barefoot all day.
I remember the stories of Abebe Bikila winning the two Olympic marathon Gold Medals in 1960 and 1964 but I couldn't even do what Zola Budd did on a clean track a generation later. Because I have not been barefoot all my life my body is not adapted to be able to work barefoot. I would just be grateful that I do qualify for early retirement.
However if those like me also can't work who will deliver stuff to you like many are doing to counter COVID by staying out of market places? If all humanity suddenly became barefoot there would be a die off of Thanos' dream, many times that of COVID as we furiously tried to get robots on line to replace people whose bare feet fail the demands we put on shod feet
I love going barefoot indoors, and I'm sure I'd build up calluses if I routinely went shoeless outdoors. But I get plantar fasciitis if I don't wear arch supports all the time. Not sure how to wear them without shoes.
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Solly says — Be nice!
