Socks-Where Do They Go?

Socks are an interesting thing. They will spontaneously duplicate themselves to the point your sock drawer is full of unknowns, at the same time decrease their numbers each time you do the wash. Have you ever noticed that you constantly have to buy socks or throw them away because you're missing one of the pair? Where does the mate go??? I would imagine it gets sucked into the black hole of the dryer. Or maybe if you do laundry in a public facility the hobo who lives around the corner needed a match for his lone sock so he took one. My favorite "theory" is an old Indian legend. According to this legend, socks have the most sacred job of all clothing because your feet are the most important part of your body (next to your head, heart, elbows, hands and stomach) and therefore, their protection is vital. Once they have served long enough, a giant clothespin comes and collects them at laundry day and takes them to the big bin in the sky where they are able to look down and protect other socks. It's beautiful. Growing up we always that this yellow laundry basket that would sit on the back edge of the laundry machines that was specifically for socks (mostly my dad's black socks for work). When we did laundry we would always have to pull that awful basket down and spend days (at least it seemed like that) matching the socks... and as always, there were always a pile of rogue socks that had no mate when you got done. They soon became a comfort and a frustration of mine. It was nice to see the same old guys week after week, year after year of sock matching, but sometimes they would irritate me with their taunting mystery of where the other one went. Eventually my Mom said that she was going to toss them, conveniently right at the time my job was requiring me to wear black socks. Rather than go buy my own pair I just took the ones that were left in the basket, even though they were mismatched. I didn't care, they were free and black and I didn't have to match them up! That was what was important, I don't like matching socks. After wearing mismatched socks I discovered how amazing it was. You could just devote a drawer to your socks and when you needed a pair just grab a couple random ones. You might worry what would happen if you couldn't find running socks to wear to the gym. The answer is simple. You just wear the white one with the green pompoms on it and one of the pink argyle ones. If that bothers you then get rid of your fun socks and buy nothing but twenty pairs of the exact same sock, then they'll always match. For a while. Til the sock monster gets one... and then the other socks feel bad for the other rogue sock in the wash and invite him to the drawer (even though he looks nothing like them..) and then you'll have the whole sock cycle starting over again. I think this sock thing runs in the family (in the kids). Whitney, Tyler and I all went to Whit's house for ice cream when my parents were in town and none of us had matching socks.... Sometimes this bugs Jeff that I don't wear matching socks. This is great, because if I wait long enough he'll eventually match the ones that actually have matches!!! Booyah-it's a win win. I wear matching socks so it doesn't bug him and I don't have to match them.