The Man Who Wore Mismatched Socks takes place from 1939 to 1962. We start on the eve of British involvement in World War II and end just after the Cuban Missile Crisis, in which the world's two superpowers came perilously close to ending human civilization as we know it.
The chapters are of wildly varying lengths. The 1940 and 1951 chapters are particularly long, yet 1943 is only 1,847 words. This variation in length captures the feel of our lives, where we recall some periods with much more detail and intensity than others.
At first, I named the chapters just by the year number. But then, at the urging of my wise editor Tom Bentley, I added a phrase that captured something of each chapter's essence.
Here, then, is a list of the chapters in The Man Who Wore Mismatched Socks.
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1939 – Prelude to War
1940 – The Battle of Britain
1941 – Taking Pictures
1942 – Wood
1943 – Madness Ascendant
1944 – Love in the Midst of it All
1945 – War Ends
1946 – Peacetime, Gypsum and Shoes
1947 – Misunderstood
1948 – Interchangeability Makes Inroads
1949 – Gack Strikes Back
1950 – Slore’s (It’s Beer) fires a broadside and scores a hit
1951 – Wilberforce, Spokes, an Externality and Gaudium
1952 – The Great Smog
1953 – A Linchpin and The Wain Spot
1954 – Transparency
1955 – Stealing Nuts, and Television Diffuses
1956 – Uncle Max Takes His Stand
1957 – The Thrill of Making a Difference
1958 – The Whisk Broom
1959 – The Hapax One
1960 – Shoes Again
1961 – Bespoke
1962 – Missile Crisis