William Francis Welch: January 2011

The heavy hotness of the day, which had begun to drain from the streets, was redoubled in the thickly crowded club. Some had come all innocently in shorts, and on the floor a trio of black boys had already removed their singlets, which swung, like waiters' towels, from the loops of their jeans. I propelled Phil to the bar for the sharp, gassy lager, not in itself pleasant, which was the economy fuel of the place. We leant together at the counter, his arms bulgingly crossed, and I splurged my tongue up his jaw and into his ear—he turned to me with a grin and gave me, too close to be in focus, a look of the tenderest trust.

Lugo whipped the taxi in a four-block square: Ludlow to Stanton, to Essex, to Houston, creeping left onto Ludlow again, just past Katz's, only to come abreast of a parked car full of slouched-down plainclothes from Borough Narcotics, the driver eyeballing them out of there: This is our fishing hole.

"I tried to jump into the La Brea Tar Pits when I was three, whatever that means. They caught me just in time. I was so intrigued by those bubbles going bmp bmp. I thought I would find a dinosaur down there."

I have the sandals. And I gave them to a shoemaker from New Jersey called Mr. Maxwell and asked him to copy them. He’d never seen anything like them. So I told him the story of where I’d copied them from—the pornographic museum at Pompeii, which had originally only been open to men. Those were the days of boat trips on the Mediterranean, and these old maids would save up their money for years, get themselves men’s suits, and get into the museum, where they’d holler and yell and scream and be found epileptic on the floor. It was unbelievable. The police would be brought in, these old maids would be carried out on stretchers, and eventually the museum had to be closed down entirely.
Through a friend in the Mussolini government, I was able to get in. “Nothing could be easier to arrange,” he said.
So I saw...In Pompeii, everything that can happen in life was captured in the minute and a half a volcanic eruption takes. Women are having babies, dogs scratching their backs...held forever in eternity. And in the museum I saw a woman having an affair with her slave who was wearing...
I was telling all this to Mr. Maxwell, who, naturally, was absolutely horrified. He was the most charming, gentle soul—reeked of the nicest Englewood, New Jersey, characteristics—but he’d never heard a woman discuss such things. But I went on...
The slave was wearing link slave bracelets, which I recognized immediately, because everyone had worn slave bracelets exactly like them in the twenties. But then...instead of the very elaborate sandals of a grand seigneur or a warrior, or the sandals of a gentleman of the town or a tradesmen, he wore the simplest sandal in the world. It had just one thong which went between the big toe and the one next it, and one strap around the ankle attached to the heel.
You ask why he was making love wearing sandals? He probably wasn’t given the time. She probably jumped him and he didn’t have a chance to get those sandals off; and then, of course, Vesuvius knocked them both on the floor. This was the design I took to Capri, where they made the sandals up for me from my description.
Eventually, Mr. Maxwell got over his shock. He copied the sandals. But no one could wear them. Apparently, there was something in the health regulations of New York City that said no one could try on shoes unless she was wearing stockings. Obviously, the thong couldn’t go over a stocking and between the toes, and of course that was the whole point. Somehow or other, the law was changed. Don’t ask me how—I’ve never concerned myself with that sort of thing. But from then on there was a very nice business for Mr. Maxwell.
That was the Birth of the Thonged Sandal.