I can’t get rid of a faded brown pair of socks that I got in Arusha at language school in 2016. Arusha is much colder than Dar es Salaam (where I hardly ever wore socks), so I bought them at an open-air market.
I’m not sure why I even brought these socks back to the States with me, except that we left with five days’ notice, so not all my packing decisions made sense. I knew it would be sock-weather in California in March. Maybe I thought the pandemic would make socks scarce.
In three years, I haven’t worn them. But I can’t get rid of them.
Gil is not as sentimental as me. I recently found his Tevas in the trash, his favorite ones, the ones he had re-soled on a Dar es Salaam street corner – the Maasai way, with old tires. Which meant that he walked with tire tread marks instead of shoe prints. I fished them out of the trash and protested loudly but they were indeed kind of gross. So I took a picture instead. Still, a piece of my heart went into the trash with them.
It’s been three years this month.