Day 2: Mildewed Mystery

It appeared as if from God, wadded up on the floor of the laundry room.

Mind you, that’s also the furnace room and the water heater room and the catch-all storage/work room that my kids always referred to as MomLand.

Don’t be getting ideas about some lovely Pinterest-worthy laundry space with gleaming marble tile and state-of-the-art equipment and hand-crafted Shaker storage baskets to accommodate every imagined need.

Don’t be thinking MomLand is some sort of peaceful maternal oasis where I iron socks and underwear and lovingly fold lavender-scented sheets as the sun rises and the chickadees sing. We’re talking a dark dump, down in the basement. The wet filthy towel was right at home.

And I should be grateful – that towel was right where it needed to be. It wasn’t shoved under a bed or tossed beside the couch or left to molder in a closet (not that such things ever happen in my home).

It used to be white.

It used to qualify as a Company Towel, the nice thick kind you dig out of the linen closet for houseguests (since the gray fraying ones you use yourself would reveal the sorry truth of how you really live).

Hmmm. I’m reminded of my Grammy, who left behind a dresser stuffed with clothing she’d never worn — gifts that were too nice for anything but special occasions.

Perhaps life is special occasion enough? Perhaps we need to use the damned company towels ourselves.

Just not for cleaning the garage floor, or whatever sorry fate befell this one.

4 thoughts on “Day 2: Mildewed Mystery

  1. Husband

    Guilty. It cleaned the car, though — not the garage floor. Mea culpa…

    • Remember our old friend, the recovering Catholic from Texas. At times like this, he strikes his chest and intones, “Mea Cowyboy, Mea Cowboy, Mea Maxima Cowboy.”

  2. Tony P

    The “mystery of the guest towels” has always intrigued me. Currently, my two-towel rotation includes a tattered one that should be utilized for — as Husband fessed up to — car cleaning and such. The other has a golf ball-sized hole, placed almost exactly in the middle. Meanwhile, a stack of perfectly thick, plush towels sits in the linen closet, awaiting any lucky guests who appear. I often think that I, the homeowner, should be using the thick, plush towels while the guests should be using the holey (not holy) towels, which would not only improve my post-shower demeanor but also enhance the chances for a quicker-than-planned departure by said guests. But the thought quickly passes, I dry off with my shoddy towel and I focus on more important issues — such as, why the bed in the guest room has the nice, soft sheets and we have the worn, scratchy sheets on our bed. My conclusion: We need to travel more, and stay at home less.

    • OK, so the comments are not supposed to be more fun to read than the piece itself. But please don’t stop!

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