I decided recently to treat myself to a new set of towels. The ones I have been using for years now were bought in Venice and made by Jalla of France. The replacement set I ordered are also made by Jalla. And here they are all the way from Saint-Raphaël on the Côte d'Azur, together with a lovely wee note from the suppliers. Appropriately, the colour of the towels is called Mer du sud.
The set came with instructions to give the towels an initial wash before using them. Which took me back to an incident when I was still a teenager and renting my first flat in a tenement up Dalry Road in Edinburgh. I moved into the flat on a Saturday morning. To say it was furnished would have been the height of hyperbole. So my immediate priority was to nip down to the wee Woolworths on Dalry Road and purchase a few essentials, including a kettle, a pot (in which I did all my cooking), a towel, a plastic basin and some bedding. Although I was living in Edinburgh, I was still working at the bar in the Ferry during weekends. Later that day, I got ready for work. With cold water only in the flat, I boiled the kettle, filled the basin and washed my hair. Then I set off for the bus to the Ferry. It was a strange night at the bar. People kept saying that I was looking healthy and asking if I had been away on holiday. And when we were clearing up after the bar closed, the Bossman exclaimed, “Jesus Christ, Brendan, whit huv ye been up tae? You look like fuckin’ Hiawatha!” It was only then that I sought the mirror in the gents and saw that my face, my ears and halfway down my neck was the same colour as my brand new crimson towel from Woolworths.
The set came with instructions to give the towels an initial wash before using them. Which took me back to an incident when I was still a teenager and renting my first flat in a tenement up Dalry Road in Edinburgh. I moved into the flat on a Saturday morning. To say it was furnished would have been the height of hyperbole. So my immediate priority was to nip down to the wee Woolworths on Dalry Road and purchase a few essentials, including a kettle, a pot (in which I did all my cooking), a towel, a plastic basin and some bedding. Although I was living in Edinburgh, I was still working at the bar in the Ferry during weekends. Later that day, I got ready for work. With cold water only in the flat, I boiled the kettle, filled the basin and washed my hair. Then I set off for the bus to the Ferry. It was a strange night at the bar. People kept saying that I was looking healthy and asking if I had been away on holiday. And when we were clearing up after the bar closed, the Bossman exclaimed, “Jesus Christ, Brendan, whit huv ye been up tae? You look like fuckin’ Hiawatha!” It was only then that I sought the mirror in the gents and saw that my face, my ears and halfway down my neck was the same colour as my brand new crimson towel from Woolworths.