Many solar eclipses ago, I knew a guy who always carried a towel. He was an employee of the father of a friend. Whenever he came around, he would always place his towel on a chair before sitting down.
Was this dude a character straight out of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy? Besides this one obsession, he didn’t seem to exhibit any other OCD behaviors, and he didn’t seem like a neat freak. To the contrary, he was usually somewhat disheveled and more than a little sweaty.
So one day, I finally ask the guy: “Why do you always sit on a towel?”
He explained that he didn’t want to sit anywhere that a menstruating female could have sat. I have only recently learned that this stems from the bible, which has all sorts of laws against coming into contact with ladies, or touching anything they have touched, during their monthly time.
Leviticus 15 19 If a woman has a discharge, and her discharge in her flesh is blood, she shall be in her impurity seven days. Whoever touches her shall be unclean until the evening. 20 Everything that she lies on in her impurity shall be unclean. Everything also that she sits on shall be unclean. 21 Whoever touches her bed shall wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and be unclean until the evening. 22 Whoever touches anything that she sits on shall wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and be unclean until the evening. 23 If it is on the bed, or on anything she sits on, when he touches it, he shall be unclean until the evening. 24 If any man lies with her, and her monthly flow is on him, he shall be unclean seven days; and every bed he lies on shall be unclean.
My bad for asking the question. My friend and his parents were all present to enjoy the long, awkward silence that followed.
As if on cue, the family dog entered the room and come up to greet the sitting towel man with a nudge to his crotch. His response was sheer horror and outrage. He stood up, pointed a finger at the pooch, and declared, “That dog is not proper!”
He took his towel and left.
If there is a God, he has a wonderful sense of humor.
Wilfred Knight
Author of Sex in the Name of God
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