I learned about hand towels later in life, because they were important to my wife.
As a kid, I paid them no attention whatsoever.If somebody told me, “Go wash your hands,” I did that.
But I didn’t disturb the towels. I wiped my hands on my pants.
When I got an apartment, my roommate and I bought lots of paper towels and used them in kitchen and bathroom. But it takes lots of them to dry after a shower.
So we graduated to bath towels. We used them everywhere and we also called them bathmats.
When I got married, my wife wanted different color towels for our two bathrooms. Also, they had to match the wall color, the wallpaper or the tile.
I discovered that many had seasonal greetings or popular quotations printed on them. I even went shopping with her a couple times to pick out hand towels but she told me the quotations I chose out were “distasteful” and would not be allowed in our house.
I learned that these smaller towels originated as personal linens, something people could hang on their belts to use after handwashing. I had strict instructions never to use them to pick up spilled mouthwash or to blow my nose.
In the 18th century, some smaller towels became tea towels and they were often made of fine linen. Today, our home’s dish towels are absorbent cotton. These are my favorite small towels, because I also tuck them in my shirt collar to use during TV dinners.