Winter Toenails

Winter toenails. Funny how they don’t get as much attention. I try, but time flies. It’s just easier to pay less attention to toenails when they are perpetually wrapped in socks and stuffed in shoes, mostly coming out into the light only for showering, or while sleeping, or for changes of the aforementioned socks.

It’s easy to ignore them, for a while. But on they grow.

And as they grow, it’s usually perfectly okay to ignore them. For a while.

But after a certain point, things change. Suddenly for example, those nails could cut a hole through a sock. Maybe the transition from “humble toenail” to “hazardous cutting tool” happens at a different point in their growth depending on whether you’re wearing a pair of thin, older socks versus a pair of thick newer ones.

Also, there may be early warning signs. For example, the nail may start to catch uncomfortably on the threads of your sock while you’re pulling it on.

And please, I understand that even the among those with the most frequent pedicures, given enough time, sooner or later the living foot will put a hole through the dead thing it’s wrapped in. That’s a beautiful and instructive thing to notice also, but that’s not what I’m writing about today.

So let’s recap. This has probably happened to all of us: Our toenails are growing, often ignored and literally in the dark, and whether because of that or because the socks are getting thin, next thing you know, a toe is sticking out.

I’m wondering how many other things follow this pattern:

Hidden development

proceeding unobserved (or ignored),

ultimately leading to a sudden change

that is harder to ignore.

I’m talking about the job you just can’t show up for anymore. Or maybe the marriage so perfect for you once that now so clearly doesn’t fit. The friendships that suddenly seem boring or confining. The geography that says: Move along now. The longstanding habit that suddenly begs to be broken.

The longstanding dream you’re here to fulfill. Maybe it’s time now.

And yes, you have probably noticed a few early warning signs. Maybe you’ve even known for some time and your response was to start putting your socks on differently. It can be tempting to accommodate the reality of change by preventing, for now, some of the uncomfortable challenges it will bring.

Thing is, there are kinds of growth for which there are no handy clippers, no easy solutions. And sometimes the changes we need to make are bigger than our socks.