They repaved my street this week, which means no more potholes and assorted bumps. Yea!

It also means that, for awhile at least, our street is peppered with little BB-sized balls of tar -- the detritus of road paving. They’re gooey, they’re stinky and they come in the house on the bottoms of our feet. Yuck.

So, once again, I have become the Shoe Police. It’s a role I play well.

Yesterday, my teenaged daughter went out for her daily run. Usually I mumble something about being careful of cars and staying on the left side of the road. This time? No concern for her safety. No motherly love. It was all about my clean floors.

“Remember, when you came back. No shoes inside. Especially now.”

She gave me that look teenagers give their parents when they (the oldsters, of course, not the teens) are being particularly nutty. An hour later, though, her running shoes -- tar balls squished on the soles, like tiny black roadkill splotches -- were lined up dutifully in the garage.

Victory!

Not that she hasn’t had a lot of training. For years I’ve been enforcing this No Shoes Inside rule at our house. Whenever we come home, there’s a huge traffic jam at the back door -- all of us unlacing tennis shoes, kicking off flip-flops, unbuckling sandals. Each of us has a box where we can toss our shoes. The system works. Most of the time.

Every once in awhile, someone’s tired or grumpy. Or just plain forgetful. I’ll catch a child heading through the kitchen and toward the stairs, feet still shod.

“Where are you GOING?” comes my overly dramatic, Shoe Police voice. “Not upstairs on those white carpets. No, ma’am!”

The worst offender, unfortunately, is my husband. He just doesn’t get this No Shoes Inside thing. Never has. Well ... he does, to a degree. He appreciates a clean house as much as anyone. But he also doesn’t enjoy being barefoot as I do. And a size 12 athletic shoe takes some effort to remove. It’s a job he’s not in the mood for, sometimes.

If we lived in Japan or Sweden or Switzerland -- or any of the other enlightened places where people leave their shoes at the door, no questions asked -- I wouldn’t have to be the Shoe Police. I could just pad happily across my pristine floors. Shoeless. Blissful.

Many cultures shed shoes indoors as a sign of respect. In fact, several religions, including mine, require worshippers to enter the sanctuary in bare or stocking feet. It’s a beautiful symbol of leaving behind the dirt and muck of everyday life when we enter a sacred space. I love that tradition.

I also love knowing that, in my shoeless home, there’s no mud embedded in the carpet. No traces of dog poop or lawn pesticides or parking lot oil -- none of the yucky, unidentifiable things we collect on our shoes with every single step. It’s a dirty world out there.

Most of all, I love knowing that the tar balls stop at my front door.