…much of Europe took a long hiatus when it came to regular washing, roughly from the last Middle Ages to the eighteenth of nineteenth century, and non-Westerners who encountered Europeans in those centuries were often stunned by their abysmal hygiene.
A quite fascinating account of how the concept of cleanliness in Europe and later North America was basically a social construct, how the Roman habit of daily bathing was not resumed until as recently as a century ago. The two key images that stuck with me were, first, the concentration on clean clothes rather than a clean body for the days of the Enlightenment, with Casanova priding himself on his twelve shirts; and second, the role of military hygiene, with soldiers ordered to wash every day to prevent illness, as a catalyst for changing the wider habits of society. It may be a mere social construct but I still need my shower every morning.
I only met once, but I felt I knew him pretty well from LJ and cried when I heard we’d lost him.
LJ’s had an amazingly huge impact on my life, starting with the fact that I met my husband through it, and thus two of the most basic facts about me — that I’m married and that I live in the country I do — stem from it. LJ’s lent me money, seen me through every mental, emotional and practical crisis of the last eleven years, made me a lot of my friends (and helped with some partners and even a crush or two) and honed my writing skills — little used though they are these days!
All of this leads me to the certainty that I wouldn’t now be the person I am without it…and, unlike Facebook or Twitter, I don’t mind the time and energy I’ve given it, because it’s more than repayed me what they are worth.