TP FOR THE AGES

If you believe what you read in the newspapers, environmental activists think our use of toilet paper, especially the soft, thick, puffy kind, which is actually made out of trees, needs to stop. Allen Hershkowitz, a scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, quoted by the New York Times, opines that “Future generations are going to look at the way we make toilet paper as one of the greatest excesses of our age. Making toilet paper from virgin wood is a lot worse than driving (Petrol-thirsty cars) in terms of global warming pollution.”

This NY Times article says that the toilet paper industry is being pushed by environmental groups to switch from the use of virgin trees now harvested in North America and in Latin Countries to using recycled toilet tissue (the thought of which makes me gag, but I don’t think they actually mean that the toilet tissue is recycled.) It goes on to say that in Europe and Latin America, products with recycled content make up about on average 20 percent of the market, according to experts at the Kimberly Clark Corp. Environmental groups say they want to nurture similar interest here.

There was one sentence in the article that I could personally attest to: “Other countries are far less picky about toilet tissue. In many European nations, a rough sheet of paper is deemed sufficient.” I cannot remember exactly which country I was in when I first came cheek to cheek with this “rough sheet of paper” but the paper I was expected to use appeared to be about the same quality and texture of a piece of our waxed paper, and in using it I was sure it must have had some component of sandpaper thrown into the mix.

One thing that comes out in the article is that at least our better-quality toilet paper is bio-degradable. As one who is terribly finicky about TP quality and esthetics, I hope environmental technology is absolutely unable to develop a “recycled product” that will deteriorate when wet, thus preventing a change. But if it is absolutely necessary to make this change, I hope it is after my lifetime!

While nosing around on the internet for confirmation of the NY Times article (yes, it is there and says what my local newspaper’s article does, word for word), I also learned that toilet paper was patented in 1871. I learned that TP of a sort was reported being used in China in the 800s AD. But I also learned that in the distant past other things sufficed for the job: grass, leaves, fur, mussel shells, stones, pieces of clay, sponges, -- and of course in our own more recent history Corncobs, pages from newspapers and magazines, and the Sears Catalogue (which sometimes was laughingly called the “Rears and Sorebutt” Catalog.)

I read that in 1935 Northern Tissue Company advertised “splinter-free” toilet paper. Well!

I learned that toilet paper is a useful, versatile product, according to a survey to determine what else people use TP for: Nose care – 61%, wiping small spills – 17%, removing makeup – 8%, cleaning mirrors – 7%, cleaning a child’s hands and face – 3%. Also a great many people use it to cover the toilet seat when in a restaurant bathroom stall and find the seat cover container empty.

The survey didn’t mention what my girlfriend and I used to do with toilet paper when we were 10 or 11 years old. We would tear great lengths of toilet paper into separate sheets, fold them in half, quarters and diagonally, and then use scissors to cut out areas of the tissue. When finished we would reopen the square and see what kind of pattern our cuttings had produced. That seems like a nice little project for young kids to do, but to my embarrassment there was one more step that had to be done. We set the two art projects side by side on a sheet of colored paper and then took them to a neighbor lady to determine which of the two she liked the best. If we each had 15 designs to make, we went to that poor lady’s door 15 times for her approval. The only reason I can think of that she didn’t tell us to bug off was that her landlord was my father.

I did find on the internet, while I was nosing around, about the development of sanitary napkins by TP maker Kimberly-Clark, but I think that is another subject altogether and who knows if I’ll get to that one. I think probably learning a little more about toilet paper, its uses and drawbacks, is enough for this day.