Socks, like swans, pair for life - this makes the loss of one half of their eternal partnership, for example somewhere in the maelstrom of the washing process, an unbearable disaster. One that is, for the most part, ignored by the thronging masses - too frantically engaged in materialism and rampant consumerism, pushing inexorably towards a dystopian ideal; oblivious to the plight of the lone sock as it pines and mourns for it lost soul (sole?) mate.