The baby toe.

What, pray tell, is it for?

Since we were children we were aware that one toe had roast beef; one opted out.

One went shopping; another chose to stay at home.

These were identifiable actions, or choices not to act.

But the baby toe?

After getting no indication whatsoever where it had been or what it had been doing, we are merely told only that it is on its way home.

Oh, there is a hint that whatever it did at the undisclosed location, what with the cry of “Whee” as it returns, filled it with some measure of glee, there still is no indication if what had just been done was something positive or nefarious.

The thing is just there, totally useless, never asserting itself, and, for the most part, having no raison d’etre other than making the size of the toe of our shoes an important consideration. We have to make room for it.

The only time you are ever really aware of its existence is when there is pain.

The thing catches on loose wires no matter how carefully you traverse a room bare footed, pulling whatever the item is off its perch.

It makes the most innocuous piece of furniture a torture device that wedges between it and the next toe to it. And, no matter the size or nature of the object, it seems to always be one that fits perfectly.

You never glance an object. You meet it full on.

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I have a friend who recently sprained his little toe.

My friend was not actually aware of that part of his body  (who, after all, is?) that until the encounter with the couch leg was for all intents and purposes non-existent.

Now it controls his every movement both inside and outside the house.

What shoe he chooses to wear is determined by how supportive it is of that toe.

What activities he engages in at any part of his day is up to the little toe’s ability to handle it without pain.

He cannot go out to socialize as the toe throbs and there are pain pills involved that influence his comfort and attention level.

What could possibly go totally unnoticed for a person’s entire life, a thing that serves no real purpose, as far as I can tell, when it finally does assert itself, does so with an all controlling vengeance.

It is almost as if a life well lived can most clearly be determined by whether or not a person does something that brings that toe to prominence.

For, like in my friend’s case, the accident that gives supremacy to the toe usually occurs after a high point in one’s life and nothing comes to mind that could slow or stop that high point.

It’s as if the world is your oyster to that point, but the bivalve has to clamp down savagely on that toe to call you up short.

So, I ask in all honestly, why do  we have that thing?