October 2, 2018

PUBLISHER’S CORNER

By Eloise Graham

Fifty Shades of Black

“Fifty shades?” you might ask. Yes, I am sure of it. I have a black blazer that I got to wear with a pair of black slacks I already had. But when I put them together, they clashed. The slacks suddenly took on a warm, reddish black hue while the jacket had a cool, raven-with-iridescent-blue hint to it. I have a black sweater dress that almost took on a green tinge when I put my black woolen scarf with it. So very frustrating to have so many different blacks.

But I think the most frustrating time comes when mating black socks. Laundry time was a nightmare. My husband had many pairs of over-the-calf dress socks. I also had some black lightweight trouser socks. Our daughters each had knee-hi cheerleading socks. Our son also had black socks, but his were of the bulky sport type. So mating the son’s socks was a breeze. And the daughters’ socks weren’t much harder, even though they each had two pair. They were two different sizes, so that was easy. Mine were a little bit harder, but since they were often
textured, I could usually get them correct without much trouble. But now came the challenge. About half of the pairs went together easily. Then I would get down to the last six socks. They all looked the same and I would lay them out in a row. The first one looked like it should go with number three. But number two looked pretty good with number three also. And number two definitely didn’t go with number six. I looked like I was doing the old shell game moving socks around to make sure I had the best match. And, of course, this last bit of laundry mating had to be done in direct sunlight. If I dared to mate them under lamp light, my mistakes would show up on my husband’s feet when he wore them in the daylight. So yes, I believe there are fifty shades of black.

I think the best story I ever heard about mating socks was from Erma Bombeck. Do any of you remember reading her tale of woe? She had a washing machine that she claimed ate socks. She called the repairman out to help her find the lost socks. She would go into great detail how she collected the socks two by two and loaded them in the washer. But after the wash was done, she only had single socks, not pairs. If she had washed an entire load of only black socks, I am sure she would have had a few pairs but would have also discovered the fifty shades of black.

If you want to read her tale of sock misery it was an article entitled “Socks Lost in Washer” – May 28, 1969. She had a second article, “Socks Still Lost in Washer” – April 1, 1973.

Filed Under: Humor

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