towel

Today <cue ominous music> is Towel Day.

“A towel is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have” says the The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. It then then goes on to explain a towel’s extreme and flexible usefulness as a beach blanket, security blanket, various items of clothing, a weapon and, surprisingly, for drying oneself off. But most importantly, your towel is a device to convince others that you are such a really amazingly together guy, they should help you.

The logic is explained in the Guide itself:

“For some reason, if a strag discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel, he will automatically assume that he’s also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet-weather gear, space suit etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that might accidentally have been ‘lost’, on the grounds that anyone who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still know where his towel is, is clearly a man to be reckoned with.”

For those of you who are unfamiliar with The Hitchhiker’s Guide, it is the single most popular reference book in the galaxy. It is also the name of the best-known work of author Douglas Adams. You do know Douglas Adams, don’t you? Late surrealistic literary genius, total nutcase, and one of my personal heroes.

But back to Towel Day.

Each May 25 since Adam’s death, Hitchhiker’s fans and fellow fruitloops wander through their day proudly sporting their towels as a tribute to Adams, spreading the gospel and proving to others what really hoopy froods they are. So here I sit, in solidarity with other Douglas Adams fans, my towel draped artfully over my shoulder, doing my best to convince others that I am a really amazingly together person, and that I am deserving of their assistance in all ways.

All of this has me thinking.

Metaphorically speaking, what is my “towel” and do I know where it is at all times?

Is there some item, some skill, some trait of mine which I keep handy because it is infinitely useful, something that I keep on display because it convinces others that I am a generally accomplished, together and worthwhile human being?

I have this feeling that I do indeed have a metaphorical towel…. but that I’ve temporarily lost track of it. Worse, I’ve forgotten what, exactly, it is… there’s just this vague sense of loss and puzzlement, of something important that has slipped my mind.

So while I search my memory and my laundry basket, I’d like your opinions…

Do *you* have a metaphorical towel?

Or, perhaps, do you think you know what mine is, and where I have misplaced it?

MindTWEAK: Sorry. I have no time for pithy quotes today. I need to find my towel.