Hung Out to Dry
I love my clothes dryer.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the smell of fresh clothes hung outdoors, but in my fast-paced life that aroma is a distant memory. I’m not sure, but I don’t think I have many friends today with a clothesline. I’d be happy if spray starch came in that outdoorsy aroma, but then again, I’d have to use an iron to get the effect.
Someone once told me that when I hear the comment “They don’t make things like they used to,” that the proper response often should be “Thank God.” Laundry is one of those subjects. I repeat, I love my dryer, but then again, I also love its good buddy, the automatic washer. I’m old enough to remember its predecessor and we’ve come a long way, baby.
My mom worked two jobs while I was growing up. On Saturdays she only worked at night so Saturday morning began our laundry day.
Always a slug-a-bed, I would awaken late to the sound of her wheeling the squeaky, big-tubbed machine down the back hall. She had to move the kitchen table to maneuver it next to the sink then fill it with a hose attached to the faucet. The hose was formed into a hard hook at one end to hang on the side of the tub as it filled. I often think of that today as I pull my kitchen faucet out to rinse the sink.
Having already lit the water heater while perking her first cup of coffee, Mom filled the washer with the first all-white load in the hottest water possible. Our two beds, towels and underwear required two white loads which she’d wash for about twelve or fifteen minutes each. Steam would be rising from the fat tub as I‘d stumble into the kitchen, rubbing my eyes and yawning. She always grinned, chirping, “Well, good morning merry sunshine, and how are you today?”
“Mornin’” I’d murmur, slumping into a chair in the tiny, cramped kitchen. Mom made breakfast between loads and I’d gradually come alive over my eggs to the rhythm of the agitator beating the clothes clean. It all sounded like the washday blues to me. But Mom never complained as she worked the clothes through the wringer, into the deep sink for rinsing, back through the wringer and kerplunk, into the laundry basket. While the next load washed, she headed down the back hall to hang the first basketful.
Our apartment was on the second floor of a rambling old house with a family of rambunctious boys downstairs. Their mother hung her laundry on a series of clotheslines set in one corner of the big, square backyard. Bea did her huge laundry on Mondays like most stay-at-home mothers. Not having that luxury, my mother hung our wash on a pulley line that ran from our upstairs hall window to the large pear tree across the yard. And during the school year, Saturday was the day the Flynn boys wanted to play in the backyard, preferably baseball. Our clean, wet sheets cut diagonally through the infield – the pear tree was first base. The boys grumbled, but since their mother wasn’t sympathetic, they batted balls into the towels and jumped high trying to slap the bottom of the sheets. This usually lasted only until my mother appeared again at the upstairs window.
The rattley, old window pulled down from the top; our bag of clothespins hung nearby. Mom would pick each wet item out of the basket, snapping it hard to release the wrinkles from the wringer, and lean out the window to hang it. Sheets took more than two clothespins and I can still picture her with a few in her mouth while she struggled to keep the sheets from hitting the side of the house. She hung everything as close together as possible to conserve space then reel the line out after each addition. The line sagged heavier, creaking with each added wash load, until the first item hit the pulley at the pear tree. I do remember that once or twice through the years, the clothesline gave up the ghost, snapping and dropping Mom's entire washday onto the ground. The landlord grumbled from his ladder as he replaced it, but maybe not as much as my overworked mother redoing her laundry.
One of my early jobs was bringing in the dry wash. I wasn’t tall enough at age eight to lean out the high open window so I stood on a box and reached out. I can still feel the top of the window frame digging into my armpits while I balanced and stretched at the same time. The clothesline sagged much less when everything was dry, light enough that I could manage to tug the line in. I don’t remember when everything got folded, but I do remember that crisp aroma as the dishtowels and my undershirts came in through the window. Once in a while my chore was a race with dark rain clouds and I can still put the smell of impending showers and fresh clothes together in my memory.
As I grew older, I helped Mom by hanging the clothes out, learning from watching her methods. There was, however, no lesson for frozen laundry. My fingers numbed quickly hanging the wet clothes into the icy air wind. Harvesting them was only a little better. It turned out that leaving them until the warmest part of the afternoon helped a bit, but a dress seemingly made of frozen wood is hard to pull in through an overhead window. Like I said, I dearly love my dryer.
On some of those frigid days, only necessary items were washed. Our underwear went onto a drying rack in the tub and was spread on towels draped over the radiators. No Chinese laundry ever smelled any better than our house on a February Saturday.
In those days, dry cleaners weren’t even discussed as a possibility. My mother washed everything, wool skirts, wool sweaters and cotton dresses which had at least a thousand pleats, all to be set by hand at the ironing board. Time was such a premium in our household that sometimes, when the sprinkled, rolled clothes couldn’t be ironed before they’d mold, they went into the freezer to await processing.
As Mom worked more hours, I gradually learned to iron. My mind has blocked out the scorching accidents and the mistakes I made melting the early synthetics. I think I can still smell that memory too. Did I mention that I love my dryer? … especially now as the cotton/poly blends and knits pop put wrinkle free.
My mother, who today does more laundry than any single human I have ever known, has one of those nifty stackable units, washer on the bottom, dryer on the top. And although she, too, loves the fresh, outdoorsy aroma and still hangs her personals on a wooden rack in the tub, I know she wouldn’t trade for a clothesline. She’s a smart woman with her priorities right - she also loves her dryer. For such a small family, our affections run deep.