Socks

This past weekend I went out to buy socks. A simple task, I believed, but life again took me on a tangent. You see, I wanted to buy colored socks, because I often like to wear socks with sandals. Yeah, I know, but I do. I always have, I probably always will, and now I live in Maine making this a legitimate need and not just a questionable fashion decision. The socks I have now each have a nice little green stripe where the toe portion is sewn on, and these athletic socks underneath my newly found thrifted maryjanes are too awkward looking even for me.

So I wanted to buy some colored socks. Just some simple socks of almost any color, I wasn’t picky, except that they were cotton for every day. Apparently in my area unless you want white athletic socks you get polyester socks. Yes, that’s right. Polyester socks. Oh, in the store they feel like cotton, but they’re all at least 60% polyester. I’m not a fan of synthetic fibers, although they do have their purpose, but the thought of putting a sweaty stinky polyester sock on my foot makes my toes curl. Yucky! Leaving frustrated, I came home thinking, OK, I’ll just find some online. But alas, they aren’t easy to find there either. Finally I stumbled across a company that I love, Maggie's Organics . A little more expensive, but I’ll just have to wait, save and buy three socks at a time instead of 10 in a cheap pack for $7.

Why such a rant about socks!?! Because it’s just another episode in a long list of things I try to do or find that often takes me on a tangent. A frustrated tangent that just reinforces again how I view our world, beyond socks. Is it just me or do we as a society seem to complicate things to no end, under the guise of making them easier? A good organic cotton sock doesn’t pollute the environment with chemicals, causing unknown injury to a field, that field’s neighbors, and our future ability to grow food. A good organic cotton sock can be washed, dried, washed, dried, and lasts for years and years (perhaps with the occasional mend). A good organic cotton sock doesn’t make your foot stinky, hot and possibly unhealthy. I feel like any possible foot fungus would love that new polyester sock as a growing ground. I feel like such a sock will get stinky, staticky, and probably within a few months become something that sits at the bottom of the clean sock pile, often passed over for those unattractive old green striped athletic socks.

Living “simply” today I don’t think is as simple as some magazines and books will tell you. I think living simply usually requires some objectivity, some ability to get beyond the moment you’re in, in order to look at the big picture. This might sound strange since living simply is often also about living in the moment, so you’d think this would be contradictory. But I mean getting past a momentary stress, a momentary bill, in order to choose something that will make tomorrow, or the next year more simple, and often happier. I mean that when you don’t have quite enough money to buy the groceries you would like to buy, you still buy organic milk even though it might mean you can’t have that fancy bread that you want. I mean that even though you’re so tired and the convenience of throwing your clothes in the dryer seems lovely, you decide instead to go outside and hang them on a line, and in the process give yourself the 10 minutes of fresh air, sunshine and peace that restore you. I mean when you want some socks really badly, for the fun, or the fashion, instead of buying the cheap ones to enjoy today, you wait until you’re able to buy the more expensive, but longer lasting, more comfortable and healthier ones.

Maybe it seems silly or obsessive to talk about socks. Maybe it seems complicated to think so much about something so small. But I guarantee when I finally buy my Maggie’s Organic socks I will love them more, enjoy them more, take better care of them and get joy out of something that could have just been a cheap superstore purchase that turned into a frustrating waste of money.

In the meantime I’ll just have to wear my green striped socks with pride.