3-31-22 WASHCLOTHS

There are a few things in our everyday lives that cross cultural, geographical, generational, and pretty much all other delineating boundaries One of these, as I am sure you are well aware, is …yes, you probably guessed it… the washcloth. 

Yup, think for a minute about any group of people you know who do not use some sort of washcloth. Fortunately for the rest of us, most people wash their bodies. And the most common vehicle for handling soap and water? Yup, washcloths.

I personally have a love/hate relationship with washcloths. When used for their divinely appointed purpose they’re fine. Especially nice soft cotton ones. But my mom found multiple uses for the washcloth, and not all of them involved water or soap.

One of my earliest recollections of off-center washcloth use was in the tub, only the cloth was dry. When I was small we didn't have sidewalks between the school and our house, so we walked along the side of the crumbling asphalt in Whitehall Township. When I fell on the way home from school and ended up with cinders in my knees, mom would plunk me into a tub of warm water, fold a dry washcloth, then stuff it into my mouth. She’d tell me to bite down and close my eyes. Then she proceeded to dip a stiff old scrub brush into the water, rub a bar of soap over it, and then sweep it over the cinder-filled flesh on my bloody kneecap. I’d bite like crazy, screaming at the same time, my tears starting to soak into the soft cotton washcloth. I realize now that she was saving my knees from embedded pieces of gravel and possible infection. But at the time… boy howdy!

Then there were the ingrown toenails. Same washcloth method, only this time it was me lying on my bed, my foot in her lap, a pair of sharp Revlon cuticle cutters trying to dig out the toenail that had gone awry. This is how we did surgery back in the day. And the washcloth was our only anesthetic.

I have a couple old washcloths under my bathroom sink that have stories to tell. They’re ancient relics from a set of towels we received as a wedding gift. They started their usefulness by looking pretty, folded sideways on top of the thirsty matching bath towels on our newlywed towel rack. Then, through the years, they  bathed my babies, and kept toddler’s eyes dry when cups of bath water were poured over shampooed hair.  They served as a comfort barrier between a baggie of ice and a swollen ankle. One of them sat folded under a plate that held a large philodendron on our entryway etagere for something like 15 years. It kept the antique marble top from being damaged by a ceramic plate and overflowing moisture from weekly watering. Now those washcloths have been relegated to rag status. The pattern is bleached out. You’d think that after all those years of dependable service they would get some respect, something more than being shut up in dark spaces and left to do the dirty work. Still, I am thankful for them, and even after nearly 45 years, I think of Joan and Bart Couch each time I use one, because they had gifted them to us on our wedding day. 

Sturdy and dependable Revere ware kitchen pots, well-made bath towels, a good set of sheets, quality kitchen knives… these kinds of gifts have kept people I love alive, even past death, because I think of them when I use them. I wonder if everyone else does this. Maybe this is part of why I have a hard time letting go of stuff. Too much human connection attached to inanimate objects. Everything represents something bigger than itself. 

Here's to the washcloths all over this earth, folded neatly over decorative towels, left wet and wadded in the corner of a plastic baby tub, sitting like a regiment of soldiers neatly tucked in the corner of the linen closet. Here’s to ones that hang by a single clothes pin outside the window on the sixth floor of a walk-up; thin and threadbare ones serving quadruple duty outside a small hut in a distant land; freshly dipped in cold water and folded gently on a fevered forehead. Woven, crocheted, knitted, or pressed, they are made for human hands in the human condition. In a strange way, it makes me feel connected to pretty much every other human on the planet. And, come to think of it, even the few humans we know of who float in small spaces way, way, way out there in space. I can’t think of anyone who would not have used, almost daily, some sort of cloth whose designated purpose is to wash.