Towels

You'll learn more about my family as time goes on but for now suffice it to say that they lean heavily toward the crazy side of the fence. I've toyed with the idea of lacing their summer drinks with Prozac or Valium and often wondered how they'd behave after eating some of those special brownies. You know what I'm talking about. But then again, they are so entertaining on their own that I don't think I'll ever need to resort to such subversion. One of the things that has been a consistent bone of contention, believe it or not, is towels.

Towels were the subject of the biggest blowout in my uncle's relationship. That people were using other people's towels at the backyard swimming pool was something my future aunt simply couldn't abide. That it bothered said aunt so much was a source of confusion for my laid back uncle who thinks that people should be able to use whatever towel they like. She insisted. He wouldn't budge. It became their everest, much to the amusement (well, it's funny now, not so much then) of the family. The solution came from my mother who sided strongly with my aunt. Number the towels. That way everyone would be assigned a towel labeled with a specific number and nobody would use the wrong towel. End of discussion. Beginning of endless digs, jokes, side comments, and quiet acceptance from the rest of us.

My mother went out of town once when I was a teenager, leaving my father and me to fend for ourselves. Her last words of instruction, and there were many, were that the yellow towels in the bathroom could be used until the end of the week at which point we must change to the green towels. This was an imperative. In no uncertain terms were we to use towels of any other colour at the wrong time. We thought she was kidding...no such luck. So we had some fun with it. On the first morning of her abandonment my dad left a sticky note on the bathroom mirror: "Do not, under any circumstances, use anything but a yellow towel today", it said. The next day another note was added to the first saying "Yellow towels again today. God knows what might happen if you use a green one. Let's not take any chances". I wrote a note for the next morning that said "First it was the Day of the Triffids; then it was the Winter of our Discontent; now it is the Week of Yellow Towels". It was a huge source of amusement for dad and I and the notes continued until mom's return. I wonder if he still has them?

Mom and I like our towels folded a specific way. It is nice to have them uniformly shaped and stacked in the linen closet so that the round folded edges are all facing outwards. It looks tidy and organized. We still haven't figured out how to organize our lunch/leftover containers but we sure as hell win the prize when it comes to towel origami. When I got married I showed my husband how I like the towels folded. He thought I was insane but would humour me and ask me to show him time and time again. You would think that after nearly twenty years together that he would clue in to appropriate towel handling techniques but not once did he do it proplerly. In fact, he would fold a basket of freshly laundered towels - all differently. It made no sense to me. It frustrated me beyond belief. I mentioned it to my mother and she said that she has the same issue with my dad. They just don't get it. I wonder, though, whether they purposely folded them wrong so that they wouldn't have to do it at all. Kind of like doing a shitty job washing dishes every time so that someone else will end up doing it every time instead. There may be a method to their ineptitude.

What got me thinking about towels, though, is my partner (the one who makes me so damn happy I can't stand it). I never ask him to do the laundry but he does it anyway because he's just that kind of guy. Risking coming across as neurotic I demonstrated to him the art of the towel fold and stack technique. He basically told me, while grinning and shaking his head, that I was neurotic. And then he did it right. And he's done it right ever since. Not because he wants to do it that way, but because it's what I want. It might not seem like much, but it is huge. He does it for me. I kinda like that. And my linen closet looks magnificent.