We’re getting ready for the holidays around my house. Holidays mean company. Company means one thing: break out the good towels! You know the ones I’m talking about- the ones that you or the kids are never, ever supposed to touch - the ones with the little monograms on them - the ones that are color coordinated with the guest bathroom.
We put out these towels when we are expecting guests, just like a lot of people do. I assume this is supposed to impress people – the fact that we have towels that we don’t actually use ourselves. Now I’ve become so well trained that when I’m a guest in someone else’s home, I’m very hesitant to use their towels. I really believe most people would prefer that their guests don’t wipe their hands on them and if you do, they probably talk about you after you leave;
“Harold, just come look at this bathroom!”
“What is it, Margie?”
“Just look at that! He actually wiped his hands on our good towels!”
“Incredible! You’d think he was raised in a barn. Better check the medicine cabinet and make sure he didn’t make off with my Viagra. You just can’t trust anybody that would use a guest towel! Better see if he flushed, too!”
I always feel a little guilty if I do dry my hands on someone’s guest towels. If I’m lucky or if my host has planned ahead, there will be another towel hanging around that I can use but more likely than not, I end up drying my hands on the shower curtain or the thighs of my britches.
I don’t understand why anyone would put something as utilitarian as a towel in the bathroom and then not expect it to be used but then women put a lot of things in bathrooms that they never intend for anyone to use. My wife has little bowls filled with soaps - soaps shaped like flowers or seashells or fishes. These soaps aren’t meant for hand washing after working on the old John Deere. Then there are the creams and lotions in the odd shaped little bottles that clutter up the sink and tub areas. These never seem to be used either. And of course, there are the candles – of every color, scent, and shape that a woman could ever imagine. Candles that we aren’t allowed to burn even at times when their fresh aroma could be useful.
I suppose women like these things because they are pretty and add atmosphere to the bath. Men don’t really understand the need to have “atmosphere” in the toilet but we generally go along with it. But I still don’t understand this towel thing. I’ll live with it unless it goes too far. The day my wife tells me I can’t use the guest toilet paper, I’m gonna stop putting the seat down for her.
