tilted plaid patterns

The other day I found an old sock..the only surviving one of a pair which I purchased 10 years ago. This was no ordinary sock though. This particular one represents a long important era of my life. It does seem odd to attach such a statement to a sock, but I assure you, the sock has earned this level of value. At 16, I already had a healthy interest in patterns. I had been interested in plaid for various reasons for at least 3 years already. Something about the plaid pattern is irresistible to me. It could be the somewhat hard to swallow interjections of harshly contrasting colors, or the fact that it makes me think of sexy Irish men, whether that's politically and socially correct or not. Then strutted argyle into my life. Like a plaid that seemed, by it's 45 degree angle tilt, to be even more important, it began to infiltrate my wardrobe. I didn't have much money to work with. At the time, I had already started college, was working a full-time job, and lived on my own. But I could always find 5 or 6 dollars to drop for a flashy new pair of argyle socks. I wore them with hightop converse most often. I wore them with miniskirts. I even wore them with plaid low tops. My favorite pair were mostly black with maroon and fuschia and blue veins running through the fabric and the design. They were magnificent. I purchased them at 16, and they were my first pair of sexy argyle foot coverings. I moved around a bit during the next couple of years, and at some point, one of these precious socks was lost. I could not bear to look at the one lonely sock that was left. I wanted to continue wearing it, so I bought another pair of argyle socks which I didn't have such an attachment to and split them up so that my black one could still be worn. I couldn't find another pair in that same color scheme though. So, being the fashionably abhorrent person that I am, I settled for a pair of mismatched argyle socks. The other one was maroon, red, and purple. But it had what really mattered: it was the same height and elasticity as the black one. I sported these socks for years. I got dirty looks for it whenever they were visible, but I just didn't care. I wore them like that throughout the college years. I wore them like that through 3 longterm relationships. My friends and loved ones wore them like that too, and even seemed to covet the pair of mismatched socks, borrowing them at every opportunity. The socks consoled me through indescribably tumultuous times, and supported me while I journeyed through some of the most formative years of my life. When I saw the sock again, lurking about, once again without a mate, sticking to the inside ankle of a forgotten pair of pants, my heart skipped a beat. I remembered things I had sworn to forget. I felt present in my past and thought about the changes that had happened in me since the sock had first been worn. Then I nonchalantly folded the pants, sock still intact inside of ankle of pantleg, and I stuffed this valuable item into a plastic bag destined to be donated to the thrift store down the street. Those times were over.