Getting crosswise about lengthwise

How do you fold?

It's a question which has relevance only when you're in the middle of it: after a dinner helping the hostess fold the tablecloth; folding a quilt you've pulled off a table at a flea market; folding a sheet fresh from the dryer. Big items which need help from someone else to make a sharply folded object can lead to awkward moments.

For some reason, it's rare for me to find someone else who folds as I do: lengthwise, lengthwise, in half, half again, then just one of you completing the fold. I'd hate to think I was the strange one in this, but if I find someone who does lengthwise first (and this is more logical if an item is wide, think sheet), they usually want to come toward me and crosswise it then. There's an awkward moment, no matter how close the relationship, when one of you has to back down.

A telling moment, perhaps? As a guest, I would yield to the hostess on the tablecloth, whoever pulls the quilt off should be lead on that one, and whoever owns the sheet.

But what joy to find someone who folds as I do. Then again, see the third paragraph, second sentence.