If
you thought handkerchiefs were the exclusive provance of
Merchant and Ivory, think again. 24 year-old Kent Rodzwicz
explains how the hankie will live to serve another generation...
It’s
pure speculation at this point, but I gather I’m not
usually thought of as the romantic type.
Nevertheless, I am, at all times, prepared to lay out my
handkerchief in the soiled path of a delicate damsel. As
this has never happened, I have other excuses for carrying
a handkerchief. And they must be excuses, based on the disgusted
look I sometimes receive when a fold of linen emerges wrinkled
from the back pocket of my jeans. That specific grimace
has been perfected by those close to me, who have not yet
benefited from any chivalrous acts of handkerchief sacrifice.
As
with any great love affair, it is difficult to pinpoint
the beginning of my affinity for the handkerchief. Although
I have inherited, from my father, a propensity to perspire
at any temperature above sixty-seven degrees Fahrenheit,
I have never caught him with so much as a pocket square.
On
the other hand, my mother stands as my lone supplier of
hankies. She returns from the department store every few
months with another six-pack, sometimes corded, never colored.
An admittedly thoughtless purchase, that occurs with such
reliable frequency as to suggest a degree of compulsion.
She must have given up on my father at some point in the
seventies. But, if my arrival in 1980 had no other promise,
at least her father’s legacy of a monogrammed handkerchief
always at the ready would have a beneficiary. Without the
decades old pipe tobacco stains, she must have thought.
Mom’s
habit lay dormant until she caught me carrying a red bandana
to high school. If I was going to pat the corners of my
mouth after enjoying a meal of Mexican Pizza, tater tots,
and chocolate milk, by gosh I needed a proper handkerchief.
Not to mention the danger of that red cloth mistakenly identifying
me as a ‘blood’ on the turf of our local mall.
So the handkerchiefs started appearing in my sock drawer,
in my Christmas stocking, and once I moved out, in my mailbox.
For my twenty-fourth birthday I received a manicure kit
and a faux-alligator skin case containing eight starched
and rolled handkerchiefs.
I
still prefer a bandana for anything likely to involve blood,
grease, or heavy sweating. Like replacing a fan belt. But,
most days I carry a white handkerchief in the left-inside-breast
pocket of my jacket or right-rear pocket of my trousers
(or both). You might find it dabbing at the corners of my
mouth, swabbing my brow, or even drying my hands if the
public restroom’s accommodations were lacking. I’m
not really one for blowing my nose, but it’s comforting
to have the option. The best excuse is the provisional,
the just in case. For the image, that I also carry, of a
slippered foot pausing before a dastardly puddle of dew.
Kent
Rodzwicz is a photographer, teacher, and gentleman. He lives
and works in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Photo
by Kent Rodzwicz
