Nobody talks about the walk to bed

The Solen Base Journal

Heels up, toes curled, across the landing. For years I thought the embarrassing part was my feet. It was the choreography.

By Haider Jafri, founder · 5 minute read

A dramatised story. The routine, the objects and the quotes come from real posts and reviews we read while making Solen Base, and the people quoted were writing about other products, not ours. The narrator is a composite, not a customer.

I have a route through my own house.

Bathroom door. Two steps on the tiles, then the lip of the carpet. Left of the radiator. Round the rug, never across it, because it's pale and it was a present. Through the bedroom door. Sit on the bed. Lift my feet off the floor.

I do all of it on tiptoe. Heels up, toes curled, like a cartoon burglar. At half ten at night, in my own home, with nobody watching.

Except once, somebody was.

The night I got caught

My partner came up the stairs while I was halfway across the landing. He stopped and watched me for a second and said, "What are you doing?"

I said, "Nothing," and kept going, on my toes, into the bedroom.

It was such a small thing. He wasn't being unkind. But I lay there afterwards feeling ridiculous, and then, when my heel brushed his shin under the duvet and he did that little jump, I felt worse.

"My husband's feet act like a cheese grater on the sheets."

Someone on a forum, about their partner. I've been on both sides of that.

It's odd what embarrasses you. It isn't really the skin. It's the whole performance. The walk, the waiting on the edge of the bed, lying very still on my own side.

The walk has a lot of steps

I'd never really counted before. So one night I did.

Shower. Towel. Sit on the side of the bath. Cream on, heels first. Wash my hands, because otherwise it's on the door handle. The walk. Sit on the edge of the bed with my feet dangling, scrolling my phone while it sinks in. Then the cotton sock. Then bed.

And then, most nights, pulling the sock off at some point in my sleep because I can't stand sleeping in socks, and finding it at the bottom of the bed in the morning.

That's a lot of steps for something that's supposed to take a minute. And every one of them happens at the very end of the day, when I'm tired and all I want is to get into bed.

I found out I'm not the only one:

"I put it on my heels, wash my hands and tip toe to bed."

"My feet are all greasy and it would get on the floor, carpet, bed."

"I hate sleeping in socks so sometimes I can't wear them all night."

What the walk was really costing me

Here's the part that made me sit up.

For years I'd blamed each cream when it stopped working. Not strong enough. Wrong formula. I'd buy another one.

But if I'm honest, I never gave any of them a proper go. I'd do the walk religiously for a week. Then I'd have a late night, or a glass of wine, or I'd just be too tired, and I'd skip it. Then I'd skip it again. Then the tube would go in the drawer.

It wasn't the cream that failed on those nights. It was the walk. The walk was the part I couldn't face.

I started calling it that. The walk. It's everything that happens between putting the cream on and falling asleep, and no tube in the world has ever changed it. They all just change what's in the tube.

The walk I never mind

There's one walk I do every single day without thinking. Out of the front door in the morning, in socks and shoes.

Nobody tiptoes in the morning. You put your socks on, you put your shoes on, you go. I have never once skipped putting socks on because I was too tired.

So I thought, what if the cream went on then?

No landing. No rug. No waiting on the edge of the bed. No sock to pull off in my sleep. The cream goes on, the sock goes on, the shoes go on, and I walk out of the house on my whole foot like everybody else.

The problem is that normal socks aren't made to go over cream. I tried it once with a cotton pair and spent the morning feeling like I'd stepped in butter.

A sock made for the walk I don't mind

That's what led me to Solen Base. It's a sock made to go over cream, and it's made for the daytime. They call it the Day Sock.

It's cotton on the outside and closed toe, so it looks like a normal grey sock and it's invisible under shoes. Inside, it's lined with gel, which is the side that sits against the cream. You use whatever cream you already have. Nothing is soaked into the sock.

Cream on, sitting on the bed. Day Sock on. Shoes on. Out.

Each pair lasts 3 to 6 months, and you give your feet a rest between wears. The kit has three of them, plus a Night Sleeve, open at the toes, for the evenings you'd rather. It all goes in the wash at 40 degrees in a mesh bag.

What I liked is that they're straight about it. It isn't a cream. It won't make a weak cream strong. It just means the cream goes on at a time of day I actually keep to.

What I want

I want to walk to bed like a normal person.

I want to get under the duvet without sitting on the edge of it first. I want my partner to stop jumping. And I want to stop finding a balled up sock at the bottom of the bed.

If you've got a route through your own house, have a look at how the Day Sock works. There's a fourteen night guarantee, and you can use the cream you've already got.