By Keya Nijhawan
Socks, everyone wears them, everyone washes them, and everyone loses them (especially one of a pair). Personally, I have a basket of socks in the corner of my room, but somehow I never have matching socks. It became clear to me that this is not just my problem when I heard about National Lost Sock Memorial Day.
And there are a whole lot of socks to lose. According to the National Day website, Americans alone have purchased $11 billion in socks, so naturally, the sock industry is continuing to grow.
There is no longer one style of sock or just neutral colors; socks now come in many different lengths, designs, and colors. These socks are made for different occasions; you have your classic dress sock, your no-show socks, and of course, your fun socks.
Since there are now so many different types of socks, I wondered if certain socks are lost more often than others. Sophomore Caroline Liu said, “It’s always my everyday school socks that I lose.” For Caroline, everyday school socks are no-show socks. Sophomores Lydia and Josie Wilson agreed with Caroline; it seems the socks they lose are the ones they use the most frequently.
If no-show socks are the most common for these Sophomore girls, what socks are less common?
Well, sophomore Bailey Brunson explained how when she was little, she had these Clemson socks that were all purple with the Clemson logo at the top. She worshiped these socks and never lost them, but sadly grew out of them.
She explained that her favorite socks to wear now are fuzzy socks because they are more comfortable to walk around the house in. However, she cannot wear them to school since they get “extremely hot really fast,” she said.
This led me to wonder why people buy fun socks if they do not even wear them to school.
Caroline explained that they are just fun to buy. “Some have butterflies and rainbows,” she said.
Mr. Newman explained that he has bought his socks all over the place but right now his favorite place to buy socks is Whole Foods, where they carry Pact brand. “It’s nice when you can buy a muffin, strawberries, and some socks in the same place,” he said. He pulled up the cuffs of his pants to show me a recent purchase of sky-blue penguin socks. Josie and Lydia mostly stick to their no-show socks, but Joise exclaimed, “I wear hiking socks, though; they’re so comfy!” She’ll be ready for JOE.
Sophomore Camden Nalley takes a more utilitarian approach to socks. “I just wear the same ones every day,” he said. Seems quite boring, in my professional opinion. I also really hope he washes them.
Some people like to take off their shoes and walk in just their socks. Bailey explained she likes to walk around her house in fuzzy socks, which seems normal to me. However, sophomore Anna Fow has quite an odd taste in socks. She chooses to wear socks that barely cover her toes and heels. I feel this is fine in certain shoes, but she chooses to take her shoes off at any moment to show them off. “They’re fun,” she said.
Fun is a word that can be taken in so many different ways by different people. Each person seems to have their own unique sock choices, and it seems that many just buy the ones they like when they first see them.
However, no matter the sock, it seems that everyone has their fair share of struggles when finding a matching pair of socks.
So why are we losing enough socks to get an official day of mourning? A quick internet search offered the following theories.
The website Entrepreneur claims scientists have finally found out why our socks disappear. They say that sometimes socks fall behind radiators, never to be found again. The more plausible argument they make is that we tend to throw our socks off and kick them out of sight. We then forget where they are and give up looking pretty quickly.
The site BlackSocks found that we lose an average of 15 socks a year. Scientists have now formulated a formula to determine the probability of socks going missing, (L(p x f) + C(t x s)) – (P x A), where L is Laundry Size; C represents washing complexity (types of washes (e.g. black, white) x number of socks); P is positivity towards doing laundry; and A stands for the degree of attention, in other words, the number of precautions taken before a laundry (such as checking trouser pockets or unrolling socks).
As for one highly recommended precaution…you can listen to my grandmother, who always offers me this advice: “Keya, when you wash your socks, fold them together in their pairs so they don’t get lost.”
