The sock situation when you have three small children is out of control. In our house, a pair of socks is worn once and then rarely reunited.

The baby wears my socks sometimes. I wear the boys’ socks sometimes. I’m pretty sure my husband has gone to work with one of my socks uncomfortably stretched over his foot at some point. He’s long squirreled away a secret stash of brand new socks somewhere that I have no access to because as soon as I get my grubby hands on them, it’s game over.

Dotted around the house, there are bags of teeny tiny socks. Stuffed in Tesco bags. A little dinosaur drawstring bag. Gift bags, cloth bags. The socks pile up, procreate in the washing machine, and come out in multiples with no other half in sight. The bag thing works fairly well. Anybody who needs socks will now trot happily to the nearest bag station to select a non-pair of socks.

I think the socks are like thoughts in your brain before you meditate. All different sizes and colours: big fluffy winter offerings, skinny fluorescent slip-of-things, mean little black ones, cosy and solid stalwarts; tattered, elegant grey ones. It’s a bit of a mess in there. Sometimes when you are meditating, you get the feeling you have pulled a matching pair out of your brain bag. All those thoughts, tumbling around, become reunited and your brain feels like it’s been put back together again, briefly in perfect harmony.

Matched up with the universe.