my socks

When I buy a pair of socks, I mark one left and one right. Either new sock could be a left or a right before I mark them! It’s like they are being born when I open the package and then I tell them which is male and which is female. I always say it out loud while I am marking. Once marked, they are male or female for life unless I decide to change the markings.

I have different feelings about left and right socks. Every so often I will put a left sock on my right foot. Once a year or so I will put a right sock on my left foot. I always mention this at confession but my priest never offers an opinion. I cannot see his socks; his cassock hangs too low.

When I was a teenager and then in my early twenties, I would have trouble finding a matching left and right pair in my sock drawers. If I found two that matched in color, they would both be right or both be left. I missed more trains that way, searching.

After the fire, when I needed all new socks, I bought only one brand (Vulvue), one type (wool, over-the-calf, ribbed), and one color (brown). I keep the lefts in one set of drawers and the rights in another set on the other side of the room. I wash lefts and rights separately. I use fewer drawers for the lefts because I like to squeeze them in together. The rights get more room but sometimes I will ball two of them up, one inside the other. Once I balled up three. I haven’t told my priest about this.

When I was thirty, I hurt my right foot and had to wear a cast. By the time it came off, the left socks were more worn than the rights. I had to get rid of all of them and start over. I packed them in a mini-fridge delivery box and put them down next to a homeless person at the station. I told him that one of the socks had a ten-dollar bill in it, so that he would not throw them all away. It was really only one dollar but I wasn’t sure that would provide sufficient motivation for him.

I have some fuzzy warm cotton socks for cold nights in bed. I keep these on a shelf in my closet, in a box I call “the harem.”

I notice socks on others. Most seem unhappy.