Grandma Kathy’s Paper Towels

It’s no secret that I really dislike paper towels.  I never buy them.  First of all, I don’t like spending money on something to throw away.  I’m already buying toilet paper.  That’s bad enough.  Secondly, I hate to make garbage when I could just wash a rag if I need to clean something up.  I especially just don’t like paper towels because I hate the texture of wet paper anything:  wet paper towels, wet kleenex, wet toilet paper, just plain wet paper.  This aversion to wet paper started when I was a preschooler and my Grandma Jan (unwisely) said it was fine for me to play with a roll of toilet paper in the bathroom sink.  She was always great about letting me do messy things.  I had a great time squishing all that wet toilet paper and squeezing it and molding it into big wet paper globs, and then all of the sudden, it wasn’t fun. The soggy mass was slimy.  It had a weird, soggy paper odor.  Suddenly my tummy didn’t feel good.  I was about two steps from vomiting.  Luckily the toilet was right next to the sink.  I didn’t actually throw up, but I was very, very close, and watching my grandmother scoop out all the soggy toilet paper from the sink (it really WAS a terrible mess) made me kind of dizzy.  Ever since then I avoid wet paper anything.  In fact, wet paper actually makes me gag.  A lot.

I know.  I’m a quirky girl.

Grandma Kathy LOVES paper towels.  When she comes to visit, she always brings a roll with her.  I’m fine with that, because she doesn’t make me touch wet paper towels.  I just look the other direction when the paper towels get wet.  Grammie Kathy came to spend the weekend about ten days ago, but she forgot her paper towels.  On Friday evening, she was so very gracious to offer to watch all of the kidlets while I went to have dinner with a group of friends at someone else’s house.  It was movie night here at the house, and I ordered pizza for the kidlets for supper.  When Grandma Kathy realized she was going to be feeding the kidlets pizza, and that she hadn’t brought her roll of paper towels, she made an emergency run to the grocery store, which made me laugh.  (While she was at the store she also purchased some ice cream for a special treat for the kidlets.)  When she came zipping back through the door to my house I cracked up.  “I just can’t handle pizza without paper towels,” she announced.

I do love that lady! I especially love that she took her paper towels home with her.