Lost sock seeking sole mate

By John Marlowe

FIBER ALERT! One gray and white argyle sock. Male. Mid-calf, approximate size 10-13. Previous known whereabouts: on foot – right foot to be precise. Last seen entering a 1987, white, top-loading, Whirlpool washing machine, with several other unsavory characters. Subject believed to be in danger. Foul, very foul, play is suspected. Family is desperately seeking answers, especially his twin brother, who is frightened of meeting a similar fate. He was beside himself, and now he’s not.

It’s happened again. A perfectly good sock has gone missing.

I had taken a mountain of dirty laundry, and after a couple of hours of dedicated machine washing, I was left with several stacks of folded shirts, dress slacks, underwear, polo shirts, several neatly tucked bundles of matching socks . . . and one leftover argyle sock.

How does that happen?

It’s not like I go around undressing in other people’s houses, mind you. OK, maybe occasionally. But this sock I KNOW made it home.

I’ve searched everywhere for it. I’ve searched under the bed, rolled up in the bed clothes, under the wet towels in the bathroom, in the kitchen, in the medicine cabinet, in the car, in the golf bag. Nothing.

I even searched under the lawn mower, but the fact that I still had my two feet intact, lessened the anxiety of finding it there.

I’ve run out of places to look. So, of course, I began looking on the Internet. I was partially wondering if Trump had ever lost a sock at the White House, and whether the Left was blaming him for it. Left wing, that is. Not Left sock.

I came across a Youtube video, uploaded by a young man, who believes that socks slip behind a damaged gasket, concluding the drier does indeed “eat” socks. I’m not going to deny him this belief, because at one point in my life, I was certain that socks aren’t really lost, just “disappeared”.

I thought that a loose thread on the woven sock became entangled in the other clothes, or caught on the sides of the washer or dryer. Through the course of the many revolutions in the laundry cycle, the sock unravels into one long string of yarn. Voila! Missing sock.

I’m always finding long strings of yarn in my laundry. Sadly, my theory fell in the peer review process, when my friend found a long black thread in her laundry, but the missing sock was white.

Is it too much to ask the milk carton people for help?

I know that some of you are thinking that if I just wait awhile, the missing sock will reappear. I’ve tried. I have a copy paper box in the laundry room filled to the top with orphan socks. I’ve NEVER paired up any of them.

I’ve lost so many socks through the years that I approach finding socks entirely differently. I just wait until the other sock goes missing, too!

Anklets, bobby socks, knee socks, support hose; knitted, nylon, cotton and wool. I’ve lost them all. Heck, I could even lose one leg of a pair of panty hose.

I’m sure that one day, when I reach the great laundry room in the sky, I will find a whole warehouse full of all the world’s missing and lost – socks, chords, Jimmy Hoffa, library books, and virginity.

Until then, someone needs to invent GPS chips for socks. I know that sniffs of Big Brother, but socks are used to having a smell.

John Marlowe is an award-winning columnist for Sagamore News Media