“Monday 5 Things” ….. Sock Drawer Philosophy
November 3, 2025 by D. Paul Graham
Ever curious and always amused by the quirks of life, join D. Paul Graham each Monday for more M5T pondering.
“Calm in the Reset” photo by D. Paul Graham, Serenbe General Store, circa 2018
Every week arrives with a choice for us to make. We can rush through the week or take notice it. If you choose to notice it, even ordinary things like wonky shopping cartwheels, stubborn Wi-Fi signals, or the GPS that confidently sends us into a cornfield, are all just reminders that life isn’t meant to be, nor can it be perfectly controlled. It’s meant to be lived. Observed. Laughed at. Learned from. We don’t grow because life gets easier. We grow because we get lighter, wiser, and better at smiling in the middle of the absurd. So, before we dive into this first week of November, take a breath, look around, and remember that progress isn’t always loud. Sometimes it’s being able to say, “This used to stress me out, but now it just makes me laugh.” This Monday’s M5T reveals that wisdom doesn’t always arrive in a TED Talk, or on a mountain top. It sometimes it shows up in the sock drawer.
1. NOT ALL SOCKS ARE CREATED EQUAL. You think you’re grabbing a matching pair, same color, same thickness, same promise of teamwork. But by lunchtime, one’s a loyal cotton soldier and the other’s sliding down your ankle, surrendering halfway down your heel, like it just gave up on life. Two socks, identical in theory, radically different in execution. Life works the same way. Two opportunities may look perfectly matched from the outside, but only one will hold up under pressure without bunching, slipping, or going completely AWOL. The real skill is picking what stays right, not what looks right. Comfort in relationships, in work, and yes, even in footwear, often hides in the unglamorous details of unseen stitching, quiet consistency, and the things and people who don’t slide out of place with the day gets moving.
2. GROCERY CART REVELATIONS. You can tell a lot about a person by what they load into shopping cart. Some push ambition with kale, quinoa, and fantasy of meal-prepping like a Michelin Star monk. Others push confessionals with frozen pizza, ice cream, and a six-pack of “don’t you dare judge me.” Then there’s the middle ground, the most honest cart of all. The cart that carries yogurt, fresh fruit as well as Cruncy Cheetos and Hagen Daz ice cream. It’s the cart that says, “I have goals, but I also know how this week’s going to end.” The grocery cart is a mirror on four wheels. The organic section reveals who we want to be. The snack aisle reveals who we really are. The produce we over-buy reveals how optimistic we were about cooking when the week began. We’re all pushing contradictions down fluorescent lit aisles, pretending we have a plan. But even in the chaos of BOGO, impulse buys, and completely unnecessary artesian crackers, there’s something beautifully human about those revelations and the quiet hope that the next cartload might just make life a feel manageable. Or at least a little more delicious.
3. GROUP CHATS NEVER SLEEP. The group chat is the modern campfire. Sometimes warm and hilarious. At other times it can be chaotic blaze seemingly out of control, overpopulated, and impossible to leave without being branded antisocial. It begins innocently with one meme, one question, one quick update. Then, without warning, it spirals into chaos. Suddenly there are 47 replies, 3 completely unrelated subtopics, multiple voice notes that no one asked for, and one brave soul that has the temerity to ask, “Wait, what was the original topic again?”
Inside every chat lives an ecosystem. The over-reactor who responds in all CAPS. The ghost who never replies but somehow sees everything. The chronic 😂 😂 😂 user, who usually contributes nothing else. The self-appointed philosopher who tries, against all odds, to restore order with logic. There are alliances, side chats, and unspoken politics that rival a Fortune 500 boardroom. The group chat is life condensed. It’s loud, messy, occasionally brilliant, and always buzzing when you’re trying to sleep. You’ll never fully understand it, and you’ll never truly escape it. But sometimes, in the blur of emojis, chaos, and accidental overshares, you sometimes find connection from the digital version of friendship that reminds you that even nonsense can feel like belonging.
4. WI-FI IS A MODERN MOOD RING. Full bars lead to peace of mind, competence and belief that life is unfolding as it should. One bar can lead to despair, rage, and a total existential crisis. It’s astonishing how fast we unravel when the signal dips below two bars. The family group text stops. Netflix stutters mid-cliffhanger. Civilization teeters on the brink of complete destruction when the router light blinks red. Our emotional stability now syncs with a router. We curse the ISP like a Greek god withholding fire. We restart modems, unplug, replug, move laptops to sacred corners of the house, and whisper incantations like, “I’ll stop streaming in 4K. Please just reconnect.” The irony is that we’ve never been more connected locally and globally, and yet we can so easily be unhinged by a spinning beachball on a computer screen. Wi-Fi is less about technology and more about control. When the connection falters, we’re forced into the one state that we are being trained to avoid. Silence. Perhaps the reboot we need isn’t found in a router. It's found by remembering that peace isn’t located in another refresh, or with a full signal. Sometimes it arrives in the silence that follows when everything stops refreshing.
5. GPS DOESN’T KNOW EVERYTHING. There’s strange comfort about that robotic voice confidently announcing, “In 500 feet, turn left.” It gives the illusion that life is orderly, predictable, and perfectly mapped by orbiting satellites. But sometimes it’s wrong, and you end up on a dirt road behind an abandoned Waffle House, wondering if destiny has a sense of humor. GPS offers precision without wisdom. It can get you there faster, but not necessarily somewhere meaningful. It doesn’t know the scenic route, the detour worth taking, or that sudden urge to chase the sunset instead of a schedule. Life isn’t meant to be perfectly navigated. Sometimes the rerouting is where the story happens. The missed turn, the unexpected stop, the unknown diner, or the unplanned discovery, those can lead to the real destination. The next time that calm voice tells you to “make a U-turn,” take a chance and don’t. Maybe you’re already where you’re supposed to be, just not where you expected.
Here's to a week of loyal socks.
© 2025 D. Paul Graham, All Rights Reserved
Paul continues to deal with the absurd realities of modern life.
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