The Stress of Being a Laundress

All I can say is that my future husband better be ready to do some laundry. I’m talking 50/50. And when my future kiddies are old enough, they’ll be doing their own. Fo sho.

I give my mother serious, serious props for being such a laundry hound. She is on top of that shit like no one else I’ve ever met. The second I walk through the door, she’s pulling out my dirty clothes, popping them in the washing machine.

(Which begs the question - how old do we have to be before our mom’s stop doing our laundry? I know I am ridiculously lucky - Trissi is the exception, not the rule. But really? Hell no will I be hand-laundering my 26 year old’s fine washables. Hell no.)

Regardless, 95% of the time I am, unfortunately, responsible for washing my own things. After all, I am a “grownup”. Wamp wamp.

There are fewer things in life more aggravating than doing laundry. Especially when communal machines involved. (People - be punctual when switching your loads or picking them up. Never know what someone might do to your newly “clean” clothes.)

I have been über lucky in NYC - both apartments I’ve occupied have had laundry on-site (believe it or not, that’s fairly rare). And even though I don’t have to lug my dirty clothes and linens a few blocks to the laundromat, hauling them up and down four flights of stairs blows.

Why can’t clothes, like diapers, be disposable? I suppose that would be quite wasteful. But do we not waste water with our incessant washing?

Dirty garments are so unbelievably inconvenient. You have to stow them somewhere. And when you live in a rabbit hutch, that somewhere is tricky to pick (after much contemplation, I hung a laundry bag on my bathroom door).

Then there’s the detergent, the fabric softener, the bleach, the dryer sheets, the stain sticks. It’s all positively shelf-consuming!

Ugh, and the quarters - the quarters. Who knew those little 25-cent George Washington’s would ever be considered gems - GEMS! Perfectly round chunks of glistening gold. Seriously, gold. No quarters, no clean clothes!

Laundry is one hell of a time-consuming commitment. And, in my case, one that is also anxiety-inducing (surprise, surprise). If I make up my mind to do a few loads, it’s a race against the clock.

I dash around my apartment like a madwoman, grabbing towels and stray socks and dirty-clean jeans. Inevitably I end up forgetting a dishtowel or a dress I wanted to wash. So annoying.

Then I run down the stairs, my twenty pound Santa sack of soiled things pulling me onward to the laundry room.
Ideally I do two or three loads at a time. Which means I occupy half to ¾ of the machines. Does this make me feel guilty? Of course not. Sure, there was that one instance where a magnanimous monsieur offered up two washers to me, saying it was only “Fair” - what a nice dummy. (He was foreign.) Would I do that? Absolutely not.

There are just so many horrendific things when it comes to the laundry routine. The separating of clothes into darks and lights (or, in some really awful circumstances, the lack thereof), towels and sheets, cold wash, warm wash, hot wash, permanent press, gentle cycle.

And those are just the old school machines I’m talking about - these new age spaceship washers and dryers are nuts. FAR too many options for anyone’s own good.
Then there’s the weeding out of clothes that can be machine-dried from those that need to be hung on a rack. And let me tell you, my drying rack don’t fit too well in my hutch. Sometimes if I have company, that shit’s gotta go in the bathtub (and no, not so it’s more aesthetically pleasing - because otherwise there wouldn’t be room to move).

Omg and the folding! Unfortunately an atrociously crippling case of obsessive compulsive disorder consumes me when it comes to folding.

Must. Be. Perfect. Or. Else.

The only pro of doing laundry is that first night between those clean, crisp, scrumptious smelling sheets.
I’ll leave you with a parting piece of advisory etiquette: Empty that lint tray. Or else.