The Problem With Men's Socks
The Problem With Men’s Socks
Like millions of other loyal Americans, I watched the Academy of Oscars® telecast on Sunday, which the ABC televisioning network tricked me into starting at 7 p.m., with the pre-game, where for 90 minutes they ask actor-people about their feelings and what clothes they are wearing by which designer of clothes, but I stuck with it, the broadcast, not only in appreciation of the forced awkwardness and yelling-at-the-teevee entertainment, but to also maybe gain a bit of valuable practical Fashion information I need. Clothing!
If I were a he-actor attending one of these high-profile affairs, I would totally wear a nice dress normally associated with female clothing, especially Adapted for Television, and not some sloppy drag like the “South Park” guys did once, so I could get more camera time, since the she-actors are the ones who get all the questioning and approval (never disapproval until later, by the backbiting cowards on the post-poop shows) about their fancy ball gown and their shoes and jewelries, and the man-actors almost never get questioned about their getup unless they have gone way off the usual path of a conforming tuxedo-looking garment. When gentlemen do this and stay with male-pattern badness, they either look like they are from The Future, or else they just look like Normal People, which is to say: Slobs. Even then, if a male actor shows up in some sort of attempt to challenge Fashion, they never get asked any good details beyond like, “Did your cousin make this, Mr. Robin Williams?” or “And what charity are you wearing this attention-getting garment in support of, Mr. Robin Williams?”
I have never heard any of these Red Carpet “reporters” ask what kinda socks anybody are wearing, is wearing, or am wearing, singular, plural, and right now I am on a high-level need-to-know basis with this sock(s) topic, because the socks thing (not talking about the puppet-show segment they did on the Oscars, Jesus Christ, but almost, kinda, wait) is making me uncomfortable, I mean, I fit a size 12 man-shoe, and so when you go to an average-sized man-clothes store for men’s hosiery, the socking on offer for the average-size humale-foot in my shoe size equals a sock size of 10–12, in sock measurement, and either this size is too tight around my pinkie toe and my ankle, or it’s too tight across the top part of my foot and it makes me feel like I’m choking, or it’s too loose in the heel and the sock is baggy, or maybe it looks like the right size and shape for my feet — which, not to brag on myself, but I have good-looking feet for an amateur — then the sock is not stretchy enough to get situated properly over my foot without a lotta work, and so then I know if I buy this particular/these particular sock(s), very soon some morning I will rip it open at the ankle-part because I’m in a goddamn fucking hurry to put my socks on and it’s morning which is not a good time to be bending at the waist, and so I end up jamming my toe right through it, especially if it’s been a while since I clipped my toe-talons, which are my only line of Natural Defense, and I refuse to get myself declawed.
I tried that whole “no socks” no-socks-guy look for awhile, but then I realized my shoes were starting to do the work of my socks, which is to say I couldn’t keep my shoes in the house anymore, or in the office, because they kept reminding me they had feet in them. And look, I take care of myself, I have hot water and a shower, so it’s not like that, and I don’t eat any kinda special diet or anything, I just think people who go no-socks probably have a lotta shoes, or they can afford to buy shoes all the time, or they can’t smell their damn feet are destroying their shoes, you know? It’s like, OK, maybe your dogs don’t bark after a hard day of whatever the fuck it is you do, but there’s still like minerals and stuff coming off your feet that will attack the leather or plastic or cotton or whatever, even Crocs, man, which I was contemplating, if I couldn’t get no satisfaction, sockwise, but I realized there is already a crude but effective solution to this sock issue, and that is the Sock Garter, a perfectly respectable and conforming approach to not having to wear athletic Tube Socks to achieve comfort and stability in the lower extremities. Sock garter! They are like the lady-garter for stockings and fine hosiery, except the sock-garter goes where your ankle is covered by a men’s sock and is completely not sexy in any way, unless it is, in which case that’s fine, it’s just not on my radar, it’s all good, a beautiful spectrum of appreciations, Fashionwise and otherwise. I would like to invite members of the Sock Garter industry to send me samples and I will Field Test them and post my unbiased evaluations in this space. I live in hope Sock Garter will allow me to buy socks that are roomier at the ankles and are less aggressively elastic holding-uppy, and then I can strap on the garter and feel secure, unless this means one more thing to have to take off when I hit security at the airport, in which case I am going full Crocs.
Previously: Here’s Who Will Win The Oscars (And Why)
Mr. Wrong can converse with you via many medias. Photo from the Everett Collection, via Shutterstock.