I switched off the Dremel tool and blew the skin dust from the callous on the ball of my foot. It’s one of those callouses with a crack in it. If you let the callous get too thick, the crack breaks open and bleeds. Hence, the Dremel. I rubbed Vaseline on the callous and then on the heel. Next, I gingerly palpated the painful growth on the outside of the foot just behind the pinkie toe. There was something almost boney just under the skin, but but it slipped around like a pebble and was exceedingly tender. I could no longer walk on a hardwood floor in bare feet. I had taken to wearing flip-flops around the house– flip-flops which showed grotesque depressions just behind the pinkie toes.

Tessa was at her desk with her back to me. “Taylor Bunion,” she said. I rubbed listlessly at the swelling, not looking up. “Who’s that? One of Sean’s girlfriends?” “No. Come and look at this. I think it’s what you have.” So, I read her screen over her shoulder. It seems tailor’s bunions go back to ancient civilization– little protrusions on the outside of the fifth metatarsal. The name comes from a tailor sitting crosslegged and working while his fifth metatarsal rubs the floor. I remembered an old picture of Gandhi sitting like that and sewing.

“No, I’m not going to shave them off,” my podiatrist replied. “Why not?” “It’s not necessary, yet,” he said. I started whining. “I can’t walk in bare feet.” He said, “You may never be able to walk barefoot again.” “You’re a big help,” I said. (We graduated in the same class from the same small college, so ball-busting between us goes back a couple of decades). “What am I going to do?” “Get bigger shoes.” “Thirty years in the business and all you can tell me is ‘Get bigger shoes’?” “We’re old, Freyyudd.” (It amuses him to pronounce “Fred” with two syllables. He can’t resist.) He went on to explain: “Surgery, in your case, causes more problems than it solves. These things are mysterious. They aren’t caused by wearing small shoes. They aren’t even caused by sewing while sitting cross-legged. It’s probably a hormonal change.” I jumped at that. “Isn’t there a hormone therapy then?” He thought for a second. I saw a ball-buster taking shape in his mind as he smiled a little. “I don’t know. Maybe. If you want a scorching case of acne in your butt crack and spend your waking hours in a homicidal rage.”

So, anyway I got bigger shoes. And I got a pair of fighting shoes to wear in the do-jo. We are permitted to wear indoor-only shoes if we prefer.

But I couldn’t drop it. There HAD to be something I could do. A year earlier, my doctor referred me to physical therapy for golf elbow and tennis elbow. I’ve never played golf in my life, and haven’t played tennis since my lifetime fitness course in college. Nevertheless, I had both, in both elbows– epicondylitis, it’s called. The therapist greased up the skin over the tendons and took a concrete finishing trowel and just scraped along the grain of the tendon. She was squeezing out waste products that weren’t coming out naturally. One day, I swear to Buddha, she came in with a kitchen sink drain stopper. She started scraping my greased up elbows with that thing. She explained that it’s easier to hold, and the rounded edge does the scraping job without damaging the skin. It actually hurt less than the concrete trowel.

A year later, I’m sitting on the couch one morning about 4:30. That’s my reading time– four to six in the morning. All of a sudden, I decide to try that horrible epicondylitis treatment on my bunions. After all, wasn’t it just getting rid of waste products? I set an electric heating pad on the floor and started just grinding those bunions into the heat. Hurt like getting a conjoined twin removed with a local anaesthtic. I would stop after a few seconds and let the pain subside. I kept repeating the process. Rub. Rest. For about fifteen minutes. Then, I got a couple of frozen gel packs from the freezer to reduce the inflammation from the grinding. After fifteen minutes, I reapplied heat to bring back circulation and carry off the waste product. After a few days of this, I noticed that the pain had decreased. After two weeks, the bunions had shrunk noticeably. After a month of the therapy, I could walk on hardwood floors in my bare feet. I could even train barefoot again.

It’s not a complete cure. The bunions come back. But a day or two of the therapy after the first sign of pain, and the bunions recede. Even WebMD still says they are caused by tight shoes, but I’m still wearing the shoes my podiatrist recommended: 13EEEE, and I still get the bunions. It’s not as simple as tight shoes or sewing. But this therapy worked for me. I’d love to hear whether anyone else has tried it. Let me know. You may want to find a lead musket ball to chew on at first. The pain of the grinding will take your breath away.