In the department of things I’ve spent entirely too much time thinking about lately and now am going to spend even more time on by writing about: socks. Specifically, a pair of white and grey REI brand mini crew socks that have been a staple in my running wardrobe since fall of 2006. I bought two pairs of them, but now I only have one pair. Rather, I can only find one pair, but since it’s been about two weeks since I saw the other and in that time I’ve done the laundry twice and the cleaning lady’s been once, I think I must accept that the missing pair is just gone. Where it went, I do not know. My socks rarely deviate from the drawer to feet to laundry bag to washer to dryer to laundry basket back to drawer cycle (unless I am traveling, which I was not) but these did, and it bothers me a lot more than I think it should. They’re socks. They were nice socks, yes, but I have the other pair still and plenty of other socks besides, and it’s not like they were hand knit or of tremendous sentimental value. Yet when I realized they were missing, I didn’t just shrug and figure they’d turn up or they wouldn’t, I searched. I went through all four laundry bags (whites, lights, brights, and darks a.k.a. nights). I looked in my sock drawer several times. I looked in drawers that have nothing to do with socks. I shook out the sheets that I’d washed but not yet folded. I peered into the empty washing machine. I squinted to see under the dresser. I braved the dust bunnies behind the dryer. I unmade the bed since that’s where I’d folded the clean laundry the socks should have been in. I scolded myself for not taking better care of my things, for not paying closer attention. Yesterday I tried to buy a replacement pair, but REI doesn’t seem to make quite the same sock anymore. Writing this, it occurs to me that there’s one place I didn’t look—under the couch. That’s where my last lost sock turned up, long after I’d thrown away its mate. So now I’m nursing a tiny bit of hope that I will find my missing socks yet, even though there’s no good reason they should be under the couch. One of them, perhaps I could make a case for but not both of them? Still, until I get home and look, I can imagine they’re there, waiting for me. If they are not, I really need to move on already.