So you think I'm a grownup?
Dec. 7th, 2006 05:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
constanceLet me tell you about the socks I'm wearing today. I've been longing to tell you about my socks ever since I first got them, which is quite a while ago now, because I adore them madly; and what else is lj for, if not to share the things you adore madly with your friendslist?
To begin: they are especially pretty, as striped socks go. I say this with confidence, as I am a connoisseur (connoiseuse?) of striped socks and possess all manner of them. They are a good sort of stripe, not too thin and not too thick, and the colors are wonderful, brick red and heather grey and cream. They're the right weight for a Georgia autumn, not the heavy lambswool of a good winter sock nor the flimsy microfiber of summer. Really, the only thing that stops them being perfect is that they aren't knee socks. And I would like them anyway, if the weight and color were the only things setting them apart from my wardrobe of stripey socks. But they are not. No! No!
So here's the second thing: they have a message woven into the toes. A hard-to-read message, in cursive that looks as though it ought to be legible but really sort of isn't, and they say either "Love My" or "Leave My," depending on how you squint. They are like a dadist's tiny and inexplicable project, and I have no idea how they wound up in a sale bin at Walgreen's, but there they were, and the second I saw them I knew I had to have them.
Are they the first socks ever to make no semantic sense whatsoever? This question I cannot answer for you. All I know is that every time I think of them, which is embarrassingly often, they make me smile.
:::
Today I spoke to one of our supers over the phone. He's out recovering from hernia surgery just now, and when I asked him how he was doing, I got a bit of a TMI response. I mean, there was talk of catheters, which I don't really mind, but one doesn't expect to hear that sort of talk from someone one barely knows, does one? Anyway, I was sort of glad we were having the TMI discussion over the phone, not because of its squirmy nature, but because I couldn't stop thinking about this, which I nearly choked to death while listening to a couple of weeks ago. And I expect that most people might not take very kindly to people giggling silently over their beds of pain.
I do hope he gets well soon, though. I'm not that much of a nine-year-old.
To begin: they are especially pretty, as striped socks go. I say this with confidence, as I am a connoisseur (connoiseuse?) of striped socks and possess all manner of them. They are a good sort of stripe, not too thin and not too thick, and the colors are wonderful, brick red and heather grey and cream. They're the right weight for a Georgia autumn, not the heavy lambswool of a good winter sock nor the flimsy microfiber of summer. Really, the only thing that stops them being perfect is that they aren't knee socks. And I would like them anyway, if the weight and color were the only things setting them apart from my wardrobe of stripey socks. But they are not. No! No!
So here's the second thing: they have a message woven into the toes. A hard-to-read message, in cursive that looks as though it ought to be legible but really sort of isn't, and they say either "Love My" or "Leave My," depending on how you squint. They are like a dadist's tiny and inexplicable project, and I have no idea how they wound up in a sale bin at Walgreen's, but there they were, and the second I saw them I knew I had to have them.
Are they the first socks ever to make no semantic sense whatsoever? This question I cannot answer for you. All I know is that every time I think of them, which is embarrassingly often, they make me smile.
:::
Today I spoke to one of our supers over the phone. He's out recovering from hernia surgery just now, and when I asked him how he was doing, I got a bit of a TMI response. I mean, there was talk of catheters, which I don't really mind, but one doesn't expect to hear that sort of talk from someone one barely knows, does one? Anyway, I was sort of glad we were having the TMI discussion over the phone, not because of its squirmy nature, but because I couldn't stop thinking about this, which I nearly choked to death while listening to a couple of weeks ago. And I expect that most people might not take very kindly to people giggling silently over their beds of pain.
I do hope he gets well soon, though. I'm not that much of a nine-year-old.
no subject
Date: 2006-12-08 02:24 am (UTC)Also: DAVID SEDARIS OMG. :D
Thought I'd respond with some poetry (not mine)
Date: 2006-12-08 03:15 am (UTC)Maru Mori brought me
a pair
of socks
that she knit with her
shepherd's hands.
Two socks as soft
as rabbit fur.
I thrust my feet
inside them
as if they were
two
little boxes
knit
from threads
of sunset
and sheepskin.
My feet were
two woolen
fish
in those outrageous socks,
two gangly,
navy-blue sharks
impaled
on a golden thread,
two giant blackbirds,
two cannons:
thus
were my feet
honored
by
those
heavenly
socks.
They were
so beautiful
I found my feet
unlovable
for the very first time,
like two crusty old
firemen, firemen
unworthy
of that embroidered
fire,
those incandescent
socks.
Nevertheless
I fought
the sharp temptation
to put them away
the way schoolboys
put
fireflies in a bottle,
the way scholars
hoard
holy writ.
I fought
the mad urge
to lock them
in a golden
cage
and feed them birdseed
and morsels of pink melon
every day.
Like jungle
explorers
who deliver a young deer
of the rarest species
to the roasting spit
then wolf it down
in shame,
I stretched
my feet forward
and pulled on
those
gorgeous
socks,
and over them
my shoes.
So this is
the moral of my ode:
beauty is beauty
twice over
and good things are doubly
good
when you're talking about a pair of wool
socks
in the dead of winter.
no subject
Date: 2006-12-08 06:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-11 04:32 pm (UTC)I will post pictures of the socks, among other things, this weekend! I have it all planned!
Re: Thought I'd respond with some poetry (not mine)
Date: 2006-12-11 04:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-12-11 04:33 pm (UTC)Re: Thought I'd respond with some poetry (not mine)
Date: 2006-12-12 05:30 am (UTC)