I
have been playing tennis in an early Saturday morning league at the Gym/Racket
club for 20 years now. Recently, I have
been a witness of a curious display of human behavior. Enter Towel Man (TM). He is a fifty-year-old
guy with grey hair and a full beard.
Except for the fact that he is a bit taller, he kinda looks like Hasty
Horn, Dave Gomberg, or one of legions of middle aged men with a beard.
TM
is usually in the locker room when I return for my tennis match. I first took note of him because he always
has a huge stack of clean towels taken from the check in desk. I have counted them a few times while he is
in the shower. The number is typically
about 14! I myself make do with ONE
towel. In the dozen or so sightings, I
have never seen TM exercise. He puts on
his gym clothes and visits the sauna for a very brief period, never more than a
minute or two. Then he takes a shower; a very LONG shower of 30 minutes or so. One might ask why I am hanging around the
locker room so long, but with recent back surgery, I try to get 15 to 20
minutes in the whirlpool. Anyway, TM
has an impressive array of "products" with him in the shower. I can't image what they could all be. One Saturday recently, I actually saw him in
the gym on a treadmill machine. He had
draped the machine with about 5 towels, but the machine was not operating. He seemed to be fiddling with the controls. I observed him for about 10 minutes before
it was time to play tennis. He never
turned the treadmill on.
After his shower, TM does an extensive drying off -although he seems to use no more than 3 towels- he dresses in jeans and a sport shirt. He attaches a key ring with dozens of keys to his belt along with FOUR black boxes. One appears to be a cell phone and another perhaps a beeper. Can’t figure out what the other two might be. Towel monitors?
Like the supermarket, there are rolls of plastic bags in the locker room. They are for putting wet stuff in. TM puts each of his gym items, shoe, sock, etc in an individual bag. Either he is hoarding plastic bags or he is deathly afraid of sock or shoes touching each other.
Over
the weeks, a couple of guys who apparently know him have spoken to him. I
eavesdropped. He works at the
Jefferson Lab. Wife Kathy has heard my
accounts and dismisses the guy and just another "physics geek." I thought those physics types were
"tree huggers' and concerned about the environment and such. This guy is not concerned with conserving
resources.
I
find his habits annoying. I want to do
something. I considered powdering his
towel stack with some itching stuff, but discarded that as a possible criminal
act. Besides, I wouldn’t know where to
buy such stuff. I am now considering
placing a rubber snake in the towel collection. Who knew that the locker room could provide such entertainment?