I never thought that I would have to explain my weird habit. As long as no one noticed or I didn’t show anyone, I would be fine. But I am tired of being caught off guard and having to explain myself when people accidentally see my socks.
I was 7 or 8 and being an ornery and rebellious child, like everyone that age. And I decided not to wear socks. My mother was fed up with me and my shenanigans, so she just let me run around until my feet were cold. But I still refused to wear socks, so she gave me two different socks in attempt to make me a respectable young lady, rather than the heathen I truly was.
I seemed to love this idea of having a secret part of me be hidden from everyone. I knew that my socks were not matched, but no one else knew, unless I showed them. Which gave my childhood self a false sense of power over others. But I loved it, and continued to not match my socks. My mother no longer bothered to match them after washes, because I would simply undo the pair later. We had a sock drawer in the laundry room where all the socks went, and if you wanted a pair, that’s where they would be.
One Saturday a month, my whole family would dump out the sock drawers into three-foot piles around the living room. We would spend hours spread out around the piles until we each had twenty pairs, then we would throw the rejects back into the sock drawer.
For most people, it is not uncommon to mismatch socks once in a while. If you didn’t do laundry that week, if you are late for work, if you accidentally got a hole in one of them. It happens. But not many people can say that they spend extra energy to purposefully wear different socks.
Socks are the most underappreciated article of clothing. Many do not think about the significance of sock buying and just get the most generic kind. But socks can tell you so much about the person wearing them and how they express themselves. Are they long, short, thin, thick, black, white, striped, polka-dotted or even inside out? Matched or mismatched? It makes a difference.
Even if my socks are hidden by shoes, I like knowing that if people do see my socks it is because I feel they are worthy enough to see a part of me that not many people can see. My mismatched, fun colored and occasionally inside out socks reflect on who I am as a person: eccentric and unique. And I’m OK with that. They also make great conversation starters and Christmas gifts.
