How many times do we groan because we have baskets of laundry to do? It’s a household chore that never seems to end.
I don’t really mind it. Really, I don’t.
As a little girl, I helped my mom with the family laundry. I come from a large family, so in the summer months we had several loads to wash and dry every day. This took place in our cellar. No, it wasn’t a basement, it was a cellar, complete with rickety stairs to a slanted set of doors to ground level. Back then, Mom used a wringer washer, and we didn’t own a clothes dryer. I can still remember the wooden dowel I used to transfer clothes from the round, wash tub to the wringer, to the rinse tub, and back through the wringer for the final time. We had a canvas bag on wheels that we used to transport the loads to four long lines in the yard where we hung them in a precise order: towels next to the poles, shorter items went in the center, and we always hung the underwear on the inside line.
During my teenage years, Mom got an automatic washing machine and dryer, but we still hung clothes much of the time. I enjoyed the time at the washline with my mom, where I talked with her as we worked.
In 2011, I traveled to an African country where I experienced a new method – I washed our clothes in a bathtub and hung them to dry on a bush.
I never did outgrow my enjoyment of clean clothes and the process to get them in that condition. These days it does seem rather easy. In order to have clean clothes, I just toss them in a sleek machine, add soap, push a few buttons, and return later. Then, I either transfer them to a dryer, or hang them up in a convenient row in my laundry room. In the summer months, I wheel my wet clothes outside in a cart similar to the one Mom used. I enjoy it when I hang the them in neat rows on my umbrella-shaped clothesline. I get my dose of fresh air and vitamin D as I work. Sometimes, I feel pretty spoiled.
Happy Sunday.
And no, I won’t do laundry today. I reserve Sundays for my day of rest.
Virginia Pillars, Author 