Everyday Socks

Just this week I've realized that I only own one kind of sock. I've always thought that I owned two kinds of black socks. One with wider stripes sewn into the top and the other with narrower stripes. I've always chuckled at the fact that the first two socks I pull out of the basket never match. I almost always pull one broad stripe and one thin stripe. Seeing as I thought there were only two types I was guaranteed a match to at least one of them when I pulled the third sock. It had to be either a broad stripe or a thin stripe. So whatever that third sock I pulled was would be the kind I ended up wearing.

Somedays I would find myself down to only two clean socks, and as luck would have it one would be a broad stripe sock and the other would be a thin stripe sock. I would walk around all day agitated that I was wearing mismatched socks. Crazy little shit like that can inadvertently affect my mood on any given day. So just the other morning when I went into the basket to discover, much to my chagrin, that I only had two clean socks left I knew I was in for a long one. Sure enough, one was a thin striped sock and the other a broad striped sock. And then a funny thing happened.

A friend of mine knows this kid who's been in some movies. I don't really know the kid, said hello to him a few times, don't even always remember his name. But the first time I saw him I recognized him. Not a big deal, I know other actors who have been in some things. One of the things this kid was in was Finding Forrester. Now the only thing I remember regularly from that movie was the scene in which Sean Connery turns his socks inside out so that the stitch is on the outside because he says it feels more comfortable. For some reason whenever I think about that movie I find myself doing the same thing for a couple of days. So when I ran into my friend and his friend who had been in the movie I obviously thought of the movie. And Monday morning as I went to put on my mismatched socks I noticed that the stitch was outside on one, and inside on the other. So I took the sock with the stitch inside and turned it inside out...and suddenly had two matching socks.

And that's when I realized, I only have one kind of sock. When the sock is right side out the stripes all look broad, when it's inside out they all look thin. This entire time all my socks have matched. I just didn't realize it. Son of a bitch.

And suddenly the whole world changes yet again.