The Cavalier daily :: Monday, March 5, 1973 :: University of Virginia Library

I felt a bit abashed the
other day when I received a
tube of medicated cleanser for
acne and oily skin in the mail;
especially when it came
addressed not to "Resident"
but to my very name.

"Why me?", I asked the
madly striped blue and green
tube standing so nimbly in my
mailbox on top of a palm tree
on a postcard from Florida.
Alas, the tube could not
answer, for it was quite choked
up about having found a friend
and besides, its throat was
clogged up with "medicated
cleansing scrub" and its mouth
was sealed with plastic skin.

I hurried inside to snip off
the bit of plastic as carefully as
I could, so as not to hurt the
tube. Ah, now we could both
relax.

I walked with the now
glowing tube to my room,
gladly remembering that green
and blue had been the rage of a
color combination for teenage
bedrooms back in the days of
fashion magazines. I proudly
laid my green and blue tube
down to rest (it had traveled to
me all the way from Mr. Bristol
Myer in New York) on top of a
pile of Dickens' novels, figuring
houses wouldn't have been so
bleak back then if they had
been colored as wonderfully as
this tube was.

Yes, I had been chosen to
receive a free sample of
Multiscrub ("You've Got To
Feel It To Believe It")! The
instruction sheet told me
excitedly that I could use it 2-3
times daily. I soon found
myself cutting my 1:00 English
class and rushing home across
the railroad tracks, ready to
fling myself in front of a train
to prove my devotion to the
daily ritual of deep cleansing
with the "microfine
polyethylene scrubbing
particles" that "loosen skin
debris".

Oh, I suppose I could
have put the tube in my purse
and carried it to classes and
washed with it in some
bathroom (I did brush my
teeth in high school at
lunchtime when I had braces
but that was different). I
wanted to prove my love to my
tube of Multiscrub. What right
had I to expect a one-way
relationship with the tube
glowing, medicating, purifying,
deep cleansing to my very soul
and receiving nothing in
return? I simply had to cut my
class and run in front of a train
every day so that our
relationship would be truly
meaningful. But then the
big weekend came and with it
the big squeeze. In a fit of
passion to demonstrate my
gratitude to my Multiscrub for
all the good times we'd had, I
gave my tube a big squeeze and
many, many microfine
polyethylene scrubbing
particles came dancing out. We
scrubbed and medicated awhile
but that weekend was the last
for me and my scrubbing
particles. My Multiscrub left
me as I knew it would.

It wasn't sentimental about
leaving, not like the old
fashioned medicated goo
whose metal tube would wither
up, springing leaks and
shedding flesh-colored tears.
No, my Multiscrub had a
resilient personality until the
very end and even now that it
has no more microfine
polyethylene scrubbing
particles in it, it still decorates
my room. I have, in fact,
become so attached to that
tube that I am considering
changing the whole color scheme
of my room to matching blue
and green.