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Monday, January 6, 2014

Sometimes, Ya Just Gotta Go Through Stuff

I’ve been putting things away for, I don’t know, a couple hundred years now.

Look.  When your place is the size of an ambitious postage stamp, and the only bathroom has been under construction since October, the other rooms tend to fill with boxes, with towels, with the surprising number of things that will find their eventual way into your new bathroom. 

The bathroom finished, I am now free to repopulate it with the many bottles, tubes, serums, nostrums, and detritus that were in the old bathroom.

An excellent time to organize, that’s what this is.  Hair stuff over here; over-the-counter medicines over here, bath products over here –

“That’s Amy’s towel, you know,” he says.

I look up from the patch of carpet I’ve called home for the last 45 minutes.  “What?”

“The pink one,” he says, pointing.  “That’s Amy’s.”

I frown at the towel.  Frankly, I’ve always been suspicious of this one.  In a sea of blues and brown, this one is a rosy pink.

I’ve been folding this bit of terrycloth for at least three years.

“Really?”  I continue to frown in that charming, wrinkled way I have.  “Why is it here?”

Willie scratches the back of his neck, shrugs.  “I have no idea why you guys do what you do,” he says. 

Willie has just lumped all women together in a vast, towel-swapping cabal.

I stare at him, then at the towel.  I try to envision a situation in which I told Amy “everybody’s bringing towels”.

We don’t have a pool.

Our parties are never “BYOT”.

Giving up, Willie wanders back to the Green Bay game.

I pick up the phone, fold Amy’s towel one last time. 

Laughingly, Amy tells me she has pink towels but can’t imagine why I would have one of them. 

I hang up, perplexed.


This is going to bug me for a while. 

38 comments:

savannah said...

maybe she brought over a casserole and wrapped it in a towel to keep it warm? *said the woman who has done that before* cheers, sugar! ;) xoxoxo

Shelly said...

Willie knew it was hers- maybe he remembers how you ended up with it. Pics of the new bathroom, please!

Anonymous said...

Remodelling, redecorating, chuckin-out days, organization....you're in MY zone now girl. Hey, maybe you borrowed the towel when you were at her house and took it home to wash.

Yamini MacLean said...

Hari OM
Least said, best mended? YAM xx

Camille said...

I too have a mauvy-pinkish towel I cannot account for...and a strange dog leash. Does Amy have a dog? Has she ever visited NH? I could send the pink towel over to add to her collection...I'll throw in the dog leash for free.

Sioux Roslawski said...

Does Amy have a cat? If she does, obviously you did not have a BYOT party, but maybe Liza Bean did?

Think about it...

Launna said...

I love reading other people's ideas of how you ended up with the towel.... ;-)

Leenie said...

Towels are like socks. They have secret lives of their own. Some escape and move to new homes. You find the ones that didn't make it on the sidewalk, in the park, hanging out at the car wash. Amy's towel may have been unhappy where she lived and, like a stray cat, wandered over to Pearl's.

jenny_o said...

Do you bleach your towels? Brown can turn pink. But it's not a healthy pink. Or, did you have a bridal or baby shower and someone misunderstood?

Oooooh, Pearl, now it's driving me crazy too!

Jono said...

I would blame the cats. They're always dragging stuff home that they conveniently "found".

Pearl said...

Amy has a dog -- a remarkably sincere animal with an almost unhealthy zest for life...

Good idea, Savannah, re: the casserole-wrapped-in-a-towel bit, as that is how I acquired a kitchen towel and a pair of gloves over the holidays!

I don't bleach anything, honestly.

I do enjoy the idea that the towel just wasn't happy where it was though, heard rumors that Pearl's bathroom be jumpin'.

I also enjoy the idea of one of the cats slinking over there and just outright stealing a towel.

fmcgmccllc said...

What is really odd is that Willie knew whose towel that was and it took him 3 years to mention this and then he did not finish the story. Why Willie are you keeping us in suspense.

Pearl said...

Hey, yeah!

How did Willie know this all this time and not mention it?!

Simply Suthern said...

Maybe during one of your remodels someone needed a trowel and they thought you said towel.

Joanne Noragon said...

Leenie already told you how it happens. They escape through cracks in the cupboards and who knows where or when they turn up. Seems to have liked your place. Knew there would be a new bathroom in it's life!

Watson said...

Did you happen to find a stray black sock along with the towel? Anyone??

jenny_o said...

"I don't bleach anything, honestly."

Said the gal who leaves clients' cleaned homes with that eau-de-pool scent :)

Geo. said...

As you know, I have made a study of mysteries and have learned this: Pearl, sometimes towels just decide to change color. This suggest sentience.

vanilla said...

Yet the question hangs there: How did Willie know it was Amy;'s towel?

Elephant's Child said...

Perhaps Amy thought that your home belonged in 'Hitchhikers Guide' and she brought the towel to feel safe. And is too embarrassed to admitt it.

Mandy_Fish said...

I thought Amy was going to be a lost love or a former spouse. It was so odd to find out Amy was alive/still in the picture. ;-P

Connie said...

I hope you figure this out. I know I'm not going to be able to sleep tonight without knowing how the towel got to your house. :-)

The Geezers said...

At our house, it's strange silverware that seem to appear unbidden in our cutlery drawer. I'm convince the forks and spoons are breeding, producing hybrids that bear no resemblance to the parents.

Don't lose sleep over it. You have more important things to fret about....

Z said...

I blame strange towels on my mother, cutlery on my husband. No idea where the small pink sock came from though.

maurcheen said...

Happy New Pee'er! :¬)

xxx

Amy said...

It came from the other side of where the missing socks go. That can be the only explanation.

Gigi said...

Glad to know I'm not the only one who ends up with random towels, strange cutlery, clothes and stuff. I blame it all on Man-Child...but then I don't have cats.

Anonymous said...

Erma Bombeck once said that socks that disappear from the dryer went to live with Jesus. Can't remember any explanation for suddenly appearing towels, though!!

WrathofDawn said...

I have a rogue table soon in my cutlery drawer. No idea how it got there or whence it came.

I just read it's even colder than usual in your neck of the woods. Good job you have an extra towel. You might be glad of the extra layer. Stay warm!

WrathofDawn said...

Tablespoon. Damned autocorrect.

HermanTurnip said...

Possessing a foreign towel is much like finding your picture posted online on a strange blog that you've never visited, and you have no idea who the blogger is. Disconcerting, to say the least. I think I'd rather have the towel...

Bill Lisleman said...

Willie just discover a key to the universe - a towel-swapping cabal of women. Amazing.

Rose L said...

Next time you go to her place, sneak the towel in and mix it among the towels in her linen closet. Then when she sees it there, she will wonder...

Linda O'Connell said...

Willie holds the key to the mystery. Threaten him with a bar of soap until he reveals how he knows this.

River said...

I'm with whatshisname...how did Willie know and why has he never said anything. More to the point, how have you not wondered why you have a single pink towel in amongst the other colours?

Starting Over, Accepting Changes - Maybe said...

You just saw it in her bathroom, liked it, stuck it under your clothes and took it home. You have blocked it out of your mind but secretly are coveting the washcloth that matches it.

Pat Tillett said...

Maybe it was used as an emergency scarf during a particularly cold day.

Busy Bee Suz said...

One of the great mysteries of life. "Where did this come from?" and "Why did I just walk in HERE?"