What a pair to draw to…

This morning as I was rousting the Denizens from their warm beds and forcing them to endure the indignities of getting dressed, I realized that I had forgotten to grab a pair of socks for Captain Adventure.

Dang. Have to go all the way back upstairs now…But wait! I have a seven year old! Surely I can ask my seven year old to grab a pair of socks out of his drawer, right? I mean! They’re all rolled up in pairs! Shoot, my four year old could probably handle this!

“Eldest! Can you do me a favor? Could you go upstairs and get a pair of socks out of Captain Adventure’s drawer?”

“OK!” she says, enthusiastically.

{THUMPA-THUMPA-THUMPA-THUMPA!} go her little feet up the stairs. The drawers are opened and shut with great enthusiasm.

There is a long, long pause. A long pause. A ‘what, did you have to drive to WalMart for those things?’ pause.

After which the little feet make the reverse trek down the stairs and she comes skidding into the laundry/changing room clutching two socks.

One sized for a newborn, the other one of her own. She flung them at me and turned to run off.

“Hang on,” I commanded, holding up the mismatched pair. “Do these make a pair?”

She regarded them studiously, then opined that nooooooo – no, they did not.

“Can you get me a pair?” I asked, when it became obvious that she wasn’t going to make that particular connection.

“Oh. OK!”

{THUMPA-THUMPA-THUMPA-THUMPA!} {vigorous drawer opening and shutting} {THUMPA-THUMPA-THUMPA-THUMPA!} {skiiiiiiiiiiiiid}

And she handed me, with a huge flourish a (one, uno, singular) sock of the extraordinarily frilly and bow-ridden variety. In size LARGE. Both of his little feet could have gone into that one sock. His very squirmy feet, because by this time he’s lost all patience for hanging out on the changing pad waiting to get his shoes put on.

I took it and looked at it for a moment. Then I asked, slowly and with great emphasis, “Eldest. How many feet does Captain Adventure have?”

“Oh {giggle}. Sorry.”

“And Eldest?”

“What?”

“Is this one of his socks?” If the size didn’t give away the answer, the enormous pink bow waving listlessly from the cuff did.

“Oh. {more giggling} No.”

“Honey, please don’t be silly right now. I need a pair of his socks. Just get me one of the pairs of socks in his drawer.”

She began trying to tell me there were no socks in his drawer. None. She had had to take a dogsled to Canada to find the one sock she had just brought down. Nine hundred miles, uphill in the snow, barefoot, both ways!

Eventually, I let out an, “Oh for heaven’s sake, Eldest!”

At which point, she collapsed into tears and lamentations. No socks. Never seen socks. There were no socks. It was an evil plot, asking her to look for the socks that didn’t exist…

And my feet went stomping up the stairs, and I slammed the drawer open, and while I will admit there were only two pairs of suitable socks in there – THERE WERE TWO PAIRS! Not one! TWO! Right there! Right there in the very front of the drawer!

If they had been a snake…I’d’ve been posting about the long wait times at the local ER this morning.

Of course…there is still the question of where the mates to the three socks she brought downstairs have gotten to…