It’s the pair of socks sitting on top of my dresser that catches my attention afterward. I don’t know what to do with them. They’re black-and-white stripes, ankle length, nylon blend, similar to socks I occasionally wear, although I prefer cotton.
But this pair has something woven right into those stripes that my feet don’t like. Feet can be so sensitive to memories and hate.
Just socks.
I understand it’s not the socks’ fault. They were never meant to be a symbol of her hatred, or of her friendship, for that matter. They’re just a pair of socks she loaned me one day for a reason I can’t even remember. If they should be a symbol of anything, they carry the fairly heavy burden of a made-in-Bangladesh stamp on the soles. In the world of socks, they are knowers of things that change lives in terrible ways.
Her hatred spun me around when it burst, but it didn’t change my life in any terrible ways. The ooze tried to seep in and poison me, as hatred does, but the ooze couldn’t hold its own against the fresh air and sunlight that poured in from the other side. The spinning snapped cords and freed me from weights I didn’t know about until they dropped away. It upended me and gave me a good shake too.
Funny, isn’t it, that upending of how things are can rattle us so much that treasures fall from our upside-down hidden pockets. I’m not glad that she suddenly hates me, but I’m delighted with my unexpected discoveries.
Still.
What to do with the socks. I feel like they deserve some uppercase respect.
The Socks.
They could become sock puppets. They could say the things that I might forget and remind me of that whole rattling, spinning, pocket-emptying experience.
I could cut them into strips to use in the braided rag rug that I absolutely will make one day. No, really, I mean it. Braided Rugs Are Us. This will happen immediately after I buy my seaside house and fill it with china tea sets and grand pianos, antique quilts, brilliant elderly books, and numerous cats.
I could give The Socks away. But would they stretch and stretch and refuse to let go of me?
Oh. Oh, I see. I don’t think The Socks have quite that ability, do they.
I don’t think they are holding on to me or the hatred or to anything but unethically produced fibers.
(It would make a great horror story though. Would you like me to write it? I’m not terribly good at horror, but I hear it’s mostly funny except for the horrifying bits.)
I, and only I, hold the meaning for all my socks. The pink-and-white ones that make me feel happy-go-lucky (specifically that word. it’s so happy-go-lucky.), the brown cable-knits that always boost my sense of academic competence, the plain black shorties that get the job done.
I won’t wear these abandoned socks again because I choose to make them the place where I dump the leftovers of a friendship gone wrong, the memories of a friend spiralling away down an unreachable gutter of her romance relationship f*ckuppery.* Not because there’s anything woven into them. It could be woven into me, of course, but that’s a different matter.
*”I don’t see why you can’t say that,” said the librarian. “It says it all. There’s no more profound word in the English language.” There’s no other word that expresses so succinctly what I want to say. Do you have any ideas? Let me know!
I don’t have to keep them or make puppets. (Although if you’d like to come over and play, I’d be totally into it. Then we could walk around the neighbourhood and entertain the neighbours with our hands in the air, talking with our sock puppets.)
They’re just socks.
I’ll drop them in my next give-away bag from my packed and overflowing closet that’s perpetually in need of yet another purge. But that’s another story.
So…do you need a pair of socks?