dannyman.toldme.com

Dishtowels

When I worked at the Pizza Place there was an endless supply of thin white cotton towels.  After use they would be tossed in a hamper and swapped out with a weekly laundry service.  One day I asked Jefe for a dish towel.  “Deesh towels!” he mocked my queer midwestern vocabulary in his Mexican accent.  To Jefe, these “dish towels” were rags.

I was just thinking about it, and back home we had a “rag bag” in the laundry closet, which was populated by torn or stained old sheets, pillowcases, shirts, and the occasional underwear.   I guess if you’re running a restaurant, you want to set a certain standard for rags.  Though, I have heard that in developing countries, underwear is considered an acceptible rag for restaurant use.

Nowadays, I buy cheap little dishtowels by the dozen from the big box or hardware store.  I’m too snooty for a rag bag: defunct textiles are retired to the trash.  Somewhere in the midwest, the ancestors are weeping over my flamboyant lifestyle.