The Finest Sheets I Have Ever Known

When we finally bought a king size bed I searched high and low for sheets that were high quality at a price I was willing to pay. I found a set at J C Penneys which were significantly marked down.

This set of sheets was the right color. The thread count was 600 which seemed sufficient. They felt right to me and they bore the magic phrase. Egyptian cotton! I didn't know for sure what Egyptian cotton was but I had seen a movie where the heroine buys a set for some shocking amount $1200 I think, and the recipient writes a song entitled Egyptian cotton.

So the color and the price were right, did I mention they were substantially marked down? I think I know why these particular sheets were priced as they were because the elastic in the fitted sheet broke the first time I attempted to put them on the bed. I probably should have returned them but since I had washed them already and they felt so wonderful I kept them.

The set came with two king sized pillow cases. Because my husband uses two pillows, one king and one standard I picked up a set of two standard pillow cases in what I thought was the identical fabric.

Well the loss of elastic was never an issue as the fitted sheet could accommodate a mattress twice the width of ours. I would tuck the edges under when I made the bed and they always stayed put. Each week I would strip this set of sheets off the bed, launder them, and put them right back on.

The color, a muted green, matched our bedroom perfectly. The feel of those sheets was remarkable! They were smooth and crisp with a hint of silkiness. I loved the feel of those sheets and they always felt the same despite the ever increasing number of weekly washings.

That's how I discovered the standard pillow cases were not the same. After 50 or 60 weekly washings the standard pillow cases began to show ware. I checked the tags on the sheets and on the cases. All the information was the same except for the words Egyptian cotton. Some how that designation didn't appear on the pillow cases. I replaced that set of cases with another set of apparent good quality but again not EC. That set wore out too over time despite only one standard case being laundered each week and the king set looking like the day I purchased it.

The third set of pillow cases I bought were Egyptian cotton and they seemed to last much better than the first two sets. Five or six years passed, and somewhere between 250 or 300 washings it finally happened, the first sign of ware. I was putting the bottom sheet on the bed and saw that a small area had been worn very thin. With the sheets on the bed said area was exactly where my husbands feet would be whenever he was in bed.

When I mentioned this to him he tried to dodge the blame saying "I doubt you put the same side of the sheet on the same side of the bed every time". Nice try sweetie. However, I do exactly that. I put the same side of the sheet on the same side of the bed every time. I think a king size bed may be square and the bottom sheet may fit no matter which way you do it but that is not the case with a queen size and that is what we had for the first ten years of our marriage. I had gotten into the habit of starting the fitted sheet with the corner that had the tag on it on the lower right corner of the bed. This was my method and I never deviated.

Consequently the tiny blue stain from some Jean Nate' body lotion always appeared on my side of the bed at knee level. I knew for sure what had vanquished my wonderful indestructible bed sheets. It was none other than my darling husbands feet his Fred Flintstone feet. Damn them! Damn those feet to hell