SOCKing Disaster

Two is company, they say. What beats me is the consistency with which this universal law fails to apply to my bloody sock collection... One wash and all those pairs become sad and lonely singles... I have realized of late that despite my efforts towards collecting books on literature, philosophy, fiction, biography my single sock collection beats all these collections put together.

My career as a Business Analyst has left me heavily disoriented with the whole concept of collecting single socks. Single socks, unlike paintings, stamps and Madonna’s used toothbrushes, are non-appreciating assets and are hence of no investment value.

It’s odd, I must confess, but the only theory that lends any semblance of logic to the whole phenomenon is that of a disconcertingly fetid fascination for single socks on the part of my maidcumlocalguardiancumsaviour all rolled into one. The only other theory that lends the entire process any credulity is the one about her dating a one-legged pirate.

I shifted to a washing machine. It was a bloody overkill with the maid already washing at an inflated EMI but anything for keeping the happy socks from getting separated.

No change. What was worse was that I’d see them go in together, all happy and paired and out they’d come in singles. No two of the same couple would ever disappear together nor would a pair ever be left untouched.

I tried discussing the problem with a few friends, all veterans in the field of socks with an average of 25+ years of experience wearing them and 5-6years in washing them.

“Your washing machine is possessed by a sock whore,” quipped one of them who’d is an ace in finding porn sites online. You got to find a cheapster which wont catch your sock whore fantasy...

That sounded nearly as probable as the pirate theory on my maid.

“Man, that must really sock!” said a Bongali Brothor friend of mine, “Well, life itself socks!”

I gave him one of those stares which make you want to shut up.

Over the next few days, I was bombarded with theories ranging from the feminist one on the uprising of the sock community to lead an independent single-sock life to the stag-minded one on the conspiracy of single socks to “de-pair” subsequent couples.

The sock community still frowns on the very idea of a widow remarriage since all socks come in happy bright couples praying against the inevitable separation every time they’re sent to the cleaners but spend their post-washing life sulking in a clothes basket waiting for the day their owner wears trousers long enough to afford no glimpse of sock.

One of my roommates at college had also discovered much to his chagrin, that the probability of a pair of socks getting “de-paired” was inversely proportional to one’s personal dislike of the pair. Hence, the Reeboks always disappeared with the first wash while the ones bought off the footpath would stay on for multiple washes developing enough holes to join the Ozone Layer brotherhood.

It’s been a year now and I haven’t really come around to the bottom of the mystery, though the sock-whore theory does give me the chills every now and then when I see antique hole infested socks bought from footpath enjoying a happy married life.