For as long as I can remember, my Grandpa wore socks that were too small. He came to America at the turn of the 20th century from a very poor village in southern Italy. He brought with him his skills as a master tailor and one good suit and saved all of his money so he could travel first class instead of steerage. Grandpa was a man of few words and rarely complained, except about the poor quality of socks. It seems that after just a few wearings, his toe would poke through. Grandma was a seamstress and often pointed out to Grandpa that the problem wasn’t with the sock itself but with his insistence on wearing the wrong size. He never argued; he just went on wearing the same size socks.
I smile as I write this but it’s a wry, self-recognizing smile. Generally, I’m pretty good at adjusting my goals, expectations, and choice of tools in response to feedback from reality. If my pants are tight, I recognize that I must re-think the belief that I’m doing fine on my diet. If my students keep submitting the wrong answers, I need to revisit how I’m teaching them. But, as my grandfather’s progeny, there are certainly a few areas where I persist in wearing a sock that’s too small. It’s my metaphor for a stubbornly held idea, clung to with ferocity despite all evidence to the contrary and I suspect I’m not alone in carrying this particular gene.
My most recent encounter with the sock lasted a year, during which time I insisted that the bone on bone arthritic joint in my hip was a minor inconvenience which I could ignore through the power of concentration on something else. The crunching and pinging that accompanied me each time I got up from the chair didn’t dissuade me. The fact that I couldn’t find a comfortable position at night for sleeping didn’t dissuade me. Not even the pictures the doctor showed me were persuasive enough. Each instance was a voice in the ear- “take care of it, take care of it, thinking isn’t making it any better!”. When the accumulated voices finally reached a shouting pitch, I took off the too-small sock and scheduled replacement surgery. The joint still hurts but at least I’m in touch with reality and have figured out what to do.
The too-small sock takes many forms. For some, it may be a naively held belief in the infinite availability of time and energy, giving free rein to saying “yes” to more commitments than can be reasonably sustained given a 24 hour day and the need for occasional rest. For some folks, the too-small sock may take the form of a one-pointed view of some co-worker perpetually cast as a monster, resulting in the pain of constant workplace friction and discontent. A particularly painful form of the too-small sock consists of training the eye only on what’s lacking, what’s not enough, what remains to be done and disregarding what’s sufficient, what’s been accomplished. Being a work wonk is a too-small sock. On this lovely, sunny Sunday afternoon, I think I’ll take a little more time to accomplish some work. Then I’ll pick up my knitting, relax on the balcony and allow some time to let my naked feet feel the ground.
[...] Original Francine [...]
September 7, 2008 @ 3:08 pm