I love laundry.
I don't mean I love havin' laundry just hangin' around in the house (though I DO love it hangin' outside on a line - which hardly ever happens anymore), I mean I love actually DOING laundry. The ritual of it. The smell of it (after it's clean, of course). The feel. It's therapy to me. And I usually am not expected to do other chores if I'm doing the laundry - which is key.
One of my earliest memories of laundry, is when I used to sit and play next to my mother in the front room while she folded fresh, clean, sometimes static-y, still warm sheets. It felt so good, and safe. Some days we'd even catch a little Secret Storm or Edge Of Night at the same time. I still can't click by a soap opera without thinking I should do some laundry.
When those old soaps would go to commercial the announcer would say, "This is NBC." And then they'd play that old music sting - "ping, PING, pong." At least I THINK that was NBC. Sometimes just watching NBC makes me wanna soak something.
There's something comforting about laundry, and laundry baskets, and back in the old days - clothespins. I haven't messed around with a clothespin for years. I used to clip them on my bottom lip and pretend I was...something. In pain mostly, I suppose - which I was. Especially with a clothespin on my lip.
And there's nothing better than getting into new, clean, sheets after you've just taken a shower. I used to have a dog that liked to get on clean sheets as soon as they went onto the bed. It was cute - for about 2 seconds. The dog was rarely clean when the sheets were.
The one thing that has always mystified me about laundry is exactly WHEN "clothes" stop being "clothes" and become "laundry." Weird. You see, while "clothes" are hanging in my closet, they're just "clothes". But the minute I take "clothes" off my body and toss them in the "dirty clothes", they instantly become "laundry" - or sometimes "dirty laundry" (except when Gidget is out of town - then it usually takes at least a couple of wearings for "clothes" to become "laundry". But you didn't hear that from me).
But think about it: the second they come off your body "clothes" become "laundry". But the moment they come out of the dryer and into the basket they are "clothes" again. Specifically they are "CLEAN clothes". How did THAT happen?
Even MORE mysterious, during the transfer between the washer and the dryer, they are neither "laundry" OR "clean clothes" or even just "clothes" - they are simply WET. They aren't wet clothes and they aren't wet laundry - they're "the wet". If you forget and leave "the wet" in the washer over night, "the wet" can become "the mildew" or the "have to wash it again". Unless Gidget is out of town, at which point it becomes "the fine" and gets popped into the dryer.
Someday I'm gonna experiment and see if I'm able to wear some "clean laundry" around town instead of "clothes" and see if anybody notices.
I love laundry.
But folding and putting away, I can't stand.
As together we stand and sing.
BP.
