The Sock Drawer

The time has come to explain “The Sock Drawer”…

One day a few years ago, my precocious teenage nieces, nephews and daughter were mercilessly, if good-naturedly, harassing us older folks (me in particular) whose minds seem to no longer be as quick as theirs. The youngsters firmly believed that age had left the oldsters forgetful, and quite possibly, empty-headed, with the accompanying inability to concoct witty, intelligent and speedy responses. The wisdom I was about to pour forth to explain this misperception was, in my estimation, a truly inspired moment. I do believe that my teenaged antagonists, however, saw it as a timely demonstration of their point. Regardless of the perspective, the infamous Sock Drawer analogy was born.

I’d like to take a brief time-out here for a disclaimer. Please keep in mind that the Sock Drawer is an ANALOGY; it is not a representation of my ACTUAL SOCK DRAWER. Thank you.

“Our brains are like sock drawers,” I began. (I can only imagine what the youngsters were thinking at this point.) “When you’re young, like you, not a whole lot has gone into the sock drawer yet. It’s not THAT hard to reach in and come out with a matched pair. When you’re older, like me, A LOT of socks have gone in that drawer and it’s MUCH HARDER to find the two that go together.”

Considering the blank stares and smirks I was receiving in response to this brilliant dissertation, I assumed further explanation was in order.

“You see, the socks are the pieces of information that come into your brain. When you’re young, you haven’t stored up a lot of these. Therefore, when you want to retrieve the appropriate information, it’s no harder than reaching into a relatively empty sock drawer, matching up the pertinent pieces and coming up with a “pair”; a witty, intelligent, or somewhat speedy response. As you get older, the number of pieces of information increases dramatically, making the retrieval MUCH more difficult, and making those of us in this position look dull, slow, or possibly hard-of-hearing, when that is not really the case at all. What may appear to you as an empty brain is actually the result of a VERY FULL brain. Really.”

Of course the first response to this was from one of my very organized nieces, who asked incredulously, “You don’t match up your socks when you put them in the drawer?!”

This is why I made my disclaimer early on - like I said, the sock drawer is an ANALOGY. Of course I pair up my real socks when I put them in the drawer. Life, however, rarely gives us our information in such a tidy fashion. We don’t open up the dryer of ideas, pair them off and stack them neatly in the drawer. Our information comes at different times, gets ceremoniously or unceremoniously dumped into the drawer, and then may need to be retrieved at the most inopportune moment. 40 or 60 or 80 years of accumulated “socks” tends to make that retrieval more and more difficult, right?

Eventually, the teens got the picture, although, to this day, I’m not sure they’ve embraced it the way I have. I guess they’ll have to reserve judgment for another 15 years or so. :) Regardless, since the day that The Sock Drawer was born, many, many comments, observations and experiences have been deemed “Sock Drawer Moments” by my family members. I’ve never been sure how to interpret their smiles as they make that declaration, however.

I still stand by my analogy, unusual though it may be, perhaps mostly for the connection that this silly moment has brought me with my children, nieces and nephews over the years. When it came time to create my blog of musings and random thoughts on life, my daughter and I agreed that “Notes from the Sock Drawer” would be a very fitting name indeed. And maybe, just maybe, my ramblings will add a few memorable socks to your drawer along the way.