I recently watched an old movie on TCM which made me laugh out loud. The hero sat down by the fireplace to dry off. He pulled his overalls up and low and behold his socks were held up by elastic garters that wrapped around his knees. Frankly, he didn’t look like much of a hero then!
Think of the big strong fellow fighting with another big strong guy and part way through, they have to stop and pull up their socks!
Or he is on a horse, tearing across the range, lassoing cattle and his socks drop to his ankles so he stops to haul them up! Oh boy.
My gramps was my hero, but he too wore the most outrageous garters also hooked to his socks. Finally, someone thought to put the elastic not just around knees, but into the top of the socks!
It sounds funny to us, but elastic wasn’t what it is today, even though it was used in clothing as early as 1820.
In a frivolous moment, I pictured King David pulling up his socks before slaying Goliath!
The phrase, pull up your socks came from a time when running was a popular sport. To pull up the socks meant that the race was about to start and the runners should pull up their socks and get ready to run.
Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. (1 Corinthians 9:24)
Pull up those socks!
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