Blow your nose

I once read an account of people from the U.S. visiting northern China. The Americans were horrified to see the Chinese blowing their noses onto the sidewalk, leaving splats on the ground. They expressed their surprise and the people turned to them, equally surprised. “You’re the ones putting it in tissues and keeping it in your pockets!”

That was several years ago, pre-quarantine. I wonder how it has changed. In the U.S. in the 19th century, those who could afford to, kept cloth handkerchiefs with them. My mother grew up using cloth handkerchiefs through the middle of the 20th century. I was given cloth hankies to play with during church; my mom showed me how to roll one up to make a cradle with two babies in it. I was old enough to notice when she discovered Kleenex travel packs. Before that we never used facial tissues; toilet paper was good enough for noses. Chewing tobacco and gum still landed on sidewalks, but I don’t remember ever seeing someone blow their nose on the ground. Having a box of soft, scented facial tissue was a sign of being well-off.

I wonder what effect tissue has had on epidemics, if you can even separate it from the other factors: clean running water, soap, industrial cleaners, vacuums, indoor plumbing with a dedicated sewer system.

My mother got in trouble once as a child; she had dropped the Sears catalog into the outhouse. There’s so much to unpack there! They had an outhouse, which is a pit toilet in a small separate building outside their home. The Sears catalog was a magazine published by Sears and Roebuck every year, advertising their sales inventory for ordering by freight. The catalog’s pages were torn out one at a time to wipe your behind in the outhouse. Dropping the catalog into the hole meant they had no wipes for their bottoms!

Remembering this makes me count my blessings. I have rolls of 1000 sheet single-ply tissue; it’s enough.