Q. I notice these days that when I offer to
strip my bed after staying with people they often say either ‘Oh leave it, you’re perfectly clean’ or ‘Oh no, we’ve just got young coming next’. Is it not essential always to provide clean sheets for one’s guests? And, if it’s not, which guests need them and which don’t?
Name and address withheld A. One school of thought deems it quite acceptable — sometimes on spurious ecological grounds — to give children and teenaged boys clean pillowcases and to leave openly on the bed the pre-used, although never ‘pre-soiled’, sheets of the previous guest. Sometimes an old trick is employed as these younger guests mount the staircase. ‘I haven’t got round to changing your bed since —— stayed for a night,’ says the hostess, naming someone inoffensive. ‘But I’ve left the clean linen on the bed and I’ll come up and help you remake it in a moment or two.’ Nine times out of ten, on coming up, she finds the youths already installed in the existing sheets, having been too lazy or drunk to bother changing them. This behaviour is unacceptable. Giving your guests the sensual thrill of slipping into a cool, crisp, pristine envelope is part of hospitality. To be favoured in this way will boost the self-esteem of even the most beast-like youth.
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