The Biblical Spectacle of Clean Clothes

It is wondrous and reassuring to know that the citizens of Biblical times were able to wear beautifully washed and pressed clothing.

Easter Weekend on Turner Classic Movies has presented an endless succession of seasonal classics about various religious figures running aground on the shores of the ever-strict and intolerant Roman Empire.

Despite the best efforts of Roman Soldiers in shiny armor to do them harm, the heroes of these Bible stories re-told manage to keep their togas and robes wrinkle-free and smelling, undoubtedly, like Fabreze.

One can only imagine the laundries of those far away times complete with washer-women of indeterminate race who rubbed and scrubbed and then took their flat cast-irons to the robes and pressed them out flat and shiny, starch on the collars, please.

No self-respecting Biblical character, after all, would be caught dead in dirty wrinkly clothing, especially not those of the ruling classes who needed to keep up appearances in order to oppress their victims with impunity and the proper disdain of superior beings.

Clearly, Hollywood spared no expense in researching the daily life of the poor in the Middle East. Let's ignore, for a moment, that authentic Arabic peoples tend to be short, dark-skinned and bearded: the likelihood of tall, blue-eyed exquisitely coiffed characters being marginal at best. But the short, dark-skinned acting pool in Hollywood must have been minimal, and it was, undoubtedly, easier to cast all those tall attractive people.

Then, of course, real history is always a little messy, what with the need for real people to take care of toilet matters in circumstances with little or no running water and a marked scarcity of pull-chain, flushable toilets.

But the appearance of the movie characters must match the cleanliness, grammar, and elocution of their well-constructed dialogue and those gloriously crafted speeches sound better coming from the lips of those tall, blue-eyed performers than they would from drooling mouths of scraggly runts.

There you have it then: Biblical authenticity with the cleanliness of a German HausFrau, the beauty of the best of Central Casting, and the fine, well-chosen words of the college educated. Clearly, the framers of the original Bible were just doing the best they could with limited means. We dare not blame them.

As Hollywood, MGM, Warner Brothers and all the other brothers (and possibly sisters) of the film making community now and then would like us all to know, Cleanliness IS next to Godliness. Thank you, Hollywood.

Things That Have Vanished From the World #2: Books Flush to the Edge of Book Shelves

Once upon a time, there was a certain way to keep books upon a shelf: All of the spines were lined up carefully so that they sat flush along the front edge of the shelf in a nice neat line. Each spine of each book flowed smoothly into the next, making a flat wall of books. Each title of each book was easily readable as your eyes scanned along them. It looked, and it was, orderly.

Today, however, visit a Barnes and Noble brick and mortar bookstore and you'll find the books shoved to the back of the shelf, the page side lined up, and the spines ragged and leering out at you like angry teeth desperately in need of braces.

There were reasons for lining the books up. It looks nice to begin with. It makes the titles easy to read. And it makes it easy to get the books off the shelf to read them without breaking the spines of clothbound books.

Now there are reasons for not lining the books up. Laziness. Bad examples. Bad training. Ignorance. And the idea that it's easier and faster to do that. Oh, that's just another name for laziness, isn't it.

I once asked a young lady why she was pushing all the books to the back of shelf. She said it was faster. I said it wasn't. She looked skeptical. I stepped over and pulled an entire shelf of books to the front edge of the shelf and evened them off with the palm of my hand in just a few seconds. She looked astounded. Bad examples. Bad training.

No one cares anymore.