I no longer wear boots without zippers. The turning point for me was when my I put on my fancy new Koenigs and broke my boot jack trying to get the left one off. There I was, my calf throbbing, my boot stuck, and my husband on a business trip. I seriously considered cutting them off myself and wondered if I could bear the embarressment of calling 911.

For other people I’ve known, the trick is to prevent the EMTs from cutting your boots off your leg after an injury. One woman I know (yes, Marianne, this is you), had a huge hemotoma on her thigh after her horse fell and she hit her femur on a metal spike. She begged the EMTs to pull off her boots . . . and they did, although they must have thought it an extreme form of torture. But, had they ever worn a pair of perfectly broken in boots?

Zippers are a relatively new feature of high end boots. I can remember when zippers weren’t an option. Then when zippers were not “show worth”, and now zippers are everywhere. Did the equestrian universe just wake up one day and realize they wanted to be able to remove their boots at the end of the day without a team of strong men? My current boots not only zippers, they also have an elastic panel. They fit so well and are so comfortable, I can’t believe we ever though they were a bad idea.

How about you? Do your tall boots have zippers or are you traditional?