Under Repairs
The server that hosted the One Shoe Diaries suffered a catastrophic failure, and the entire One Shoe Diaries website was lost. Fortunately, I do have backups of all the pages and the blogs, but it is all in raw text, so I am having to rebuild the framework and insert images. So while there are holes in my content, all of the blog content is online, justot as pretty or as organized as I would like it. And with thisot being a revenue-generating endeavor, I will be only able to devote so much time to get it fully restored to its former glory, so I ask for your patience while I get it all back up. Thanks, and have a great day!
About the Project
In October 2004 my wife Sharon and I, Randy, lost our residence on Pensacola Beach to Hurricane Ivan. Instead of treating it as a disaster we made this an opportunity for us to pursue our dream of traveling the U.S. in a motor home. During our four-year adventure on the road, weoticedumerous lone shoes sitting on the side of the road. We began to get intrigued by how many there were, and the fact that each of those shoes had to have belonged to someone, but who? Were they male or female, young or old, rich or poor? How did it end up alone on the road? The inherent mystery tied to these images is the untold story of each shoe, the viewer cannot help but create that story in their mind.
So what we have decided to do is catalog the shoes we come across through photographs along with the stories of Adventure that accompany each shoe. Hence the birth of the One Shoe Diaries™. The shoes are left in their original state, we doot alter or move them.
We have since stopped living full-time in the motorhome and currently reside back in Pensacola, Florida. Many events have happened since we first started out on this journey of life after Hurricane Ivan. We journeyed cross-country, we lost our sweet Noah at birth, we were blessed with Nora shortly after, we endured the BP oil spill as it wrecked our beaches and economy, I lost my mother, we survived the Covid pandemic, Sharon lost her sister Rachel, as well as both parents, Jack and Jinny are alsoo longer with us, and we have sold Nora’s Ark. Life throws lots of ups and downs and we invite you to experience ours with us. We hope you enjoy our ever-growing collection of shoes and the stories attach to them.
Most recently discovered Lost Soles
Latest Stories from the Road
Noah’s makes his presence known on his B-day
We make a point to celebrate our little boy Noah’s birthday every year. It is a very hard day for us yet very special and one we look forward to. Sometimes it does not make sense to call it his birthday as he was never born that day. While Sharon did deliver him physically, his spirit had already passed on. He never took a breath.
A ritual we do as a family is got to the same place on the beach and release balloons up to him with Happy Birthday wishes on them. And not to let Nora out we let her send up a pink balloon . . .
CNN.com iReport Spotlights the Hamilton Family
A solitary flip-flop sits in the white sand of Pensacola, Florida, with chunky bits of goo spilled on top and to the side like chocolate sauce. The large amount of oil that washed on shore June 23 had just marred the coastline. Randy Hamilton spots the sandal,...
A true lost soul hanging with lost soles at a bus stop
When I moved into our new place I met the neighbor, Chip, very early on who owns a sign shop across the street. We hit it off pretty well as he is an artist as well, and we share many of the same views and interests. During one of our first chats he told me about a...