Washers & Dryers

Monday, February 17, 2014

Today I am grateful for my automatic washer and dryer.  My mom, who is 87, can’t believe people these days complain about doing laundry.  She talks about how she once counted how many steps it took to do laundry, back in the day.

First, be sure it’s Monday because that was laundry day.  Then collect it from the hamper where it’s supposed to be, the chair where dad throws everything and the floor where those ungrateful children leave their good clothes; then march down the basement steps while declaring, “These steps are going to be the death of me, yet!” Repeat each time up and each time down.  Then sort.  Next fill the wringer washer with water, add detergent and agitate the crap out of everything one load at a time.  Do the light colored loads first so you can re-use the water. Then jamb it through the wringer. . .twice, pulling your fingers back just in time to save them from squishing.  Next swish in the first rinsing tub, using the cut of broom stick to stir.  Shove through wringer again.  Swish in the second rinsing tub.  Put through wringer again. Are you sensing a pattern here?  Sometimes something with starch happens to dad’s shirt collars or cuffs, someplace in here, but I’m not even sure how that worked.  

String the wash line in the basement (in winter) and use clothespins to hang clothes to dry.  If you are brave enough to tromps through the snow to hang clothes outside, like my mom sometimes did, then your dads pants would be able to stand in the corner by themselves until they thawed out of freeze-dried mode.

Two days later (for heavier stuff, in an unheated basement) take cardboard-like clothes off of the line.  No nice breezy smell from the basement stuff. . .but oh, if you hang them outside, the scent is Heaven.  And someone please tell Glade that you can’t bottle that smell because it is the true “fresh scent”. 

Lay clothes that need ironing (and almost everything did) on kitchen counter one piece at a time.  Sprinkle them from the big green-glass soda bottle you rinsed, put water in, and got a sprinkler stopper for.  Or just use your fingers and a bowl of water, but be careful to not dip and splash too much.  Roll clothes into long cylinders and store in the vegetable drawer of the refrigerator. (If you are my former mother-in-law they will live there forever.  No one knew the drawer was for vegetables, they thought it was built for laundry. You will never see those clothes again unless you are looking for carrots.)  If you don’t have room in the fridge, use a plastic bag to store. . .room temperature. . .chilling isn’t necessary unless you let them sit for a week but no woman worth her salt would have done that back then.

Get the ironing board out.  Heat the iron to “torch”.  Slap the half-damp clothes that took forever to dry in the first place on the board and press them until they are dry for real.  Be sure to get nice creases in dad’s pants.  Dry-wrinkles are unacceptable. If you have no clue what a dry-wrinkle is, ask your grandma. Put clothes away on hangers in closets, or folded in drawers.  Defy anyone to wear them again!

I lost count.  How many was that?  Back in the day women (and it was almost always women) had true reasons to complain about laundry. Yesterday it was sort, wash, dry, fold, put away. . .DONE!  Today. . .every day. . . I’m grateful for my automatic washer and dryer.