The Rape of the Sock

Somebody had been here. I knew it the second I opened the door. Nothing was where I had left it. Some malicious malefactor had penetrated my sanctum sanctorum. The godless Saracens had desecrated the Holiest Of Holies. Somebody had definitely been here.

The cheerful bouquet, that enchanting amalgam of gym locker and opium den, that had greeted my nostrils every day upon my return from the cold, cruel, world had been supplanted by the sickly sweet chemical aroma that could only have originated from a spray can.

That comforting layer of dust, which softened the hard edges and harsh colors of contemporary existence, and which when aroused, awoke into a myriad of multicolored motes that capered balletically in the sunshine as it beat through my window every morning, was no more.

That delightful disarray which chronicled my days page by page, layer by layer, had been disturbed, no destroyed, by a horde of merciless Mongols.

Can you say for certain what you had for dinner three weeks ago last Wednesday? I had only to direct my gaze to a certain point beneath my bed and I knew! A savory half mushroom, half pepperoni from Domino's. Medium. And for dessert, a second pie for only five dollars. And a 32-ounce Coke Classic.

There was a place for everything and everything in its place. My gym shorts? Right on the floor, where they belonged. My souvenir Metallica sleeveless sweatshirt ? Half in my top drawer and half out. The hand-painted Tycho Brahe necktie I was awarded for distinguished service by the Math Team? Rolled up nicely into a little ball and placed neatly inside my seldom-used infielder's glove, thank you very much.

My room was the quintessence of both beauty and efficiency. I could have lived out my days, deaf dumb and blind and wanted for nothing.

Hungry? There was always a Butterfinger or Clark Bar of indeterminate age at my fingertips. If I got thirsty, there was always a half-empty can of something within easy reach.

All my clothing was carefully positioned at ground level where I could simultaneously mix and match. I could select a complete ensemble without leaving the comfort of my bed and never wear the same one twice.

How was I to find anything now?

My pants, once amiably arrayed within plain sight and close reach, now hung closeted, in dank and dark perdition.

My shirts, once glorious in their natural state, now sat suffocating in dresser drawers, pressed into service in a manner contrary to any sane laws of God or man.

My shoes and sneakers were now aligned in soulless symmetry on my closet floor, as if in some demented close order drill.

And my socks, my poor pets. All folded flat like spaniel's ears and stacked together like slaves on the Amistad. And the smell! Had God wanted our feet to smell like detergent, He would have filled our veins with phosphates.

All my beautiful chaos, the glorious entropy that had taken me a lifetime to achieve, had been demolished in a single spasm of demented destructiveness by the ghastly Goths. Some foul Philistine had pissed on my Pollock, crapped on my Kandinsky.

My room, my beautiful Chamber of Secrets, had fallen victim to some cruel, constipated psyche who could not comprehend, could not see the beauty!

Nailed on the cross of convention by some joyless Judas, I could only cry out, anguished, in Torment and Fury!

"Mom!"