Rock Hard Suds

In which our hero just does his laundry and suggests his Gentle Reader would probably prefer to wait for another entry

As the water runs down my arms, I’m beginning to wonder if I haven’t been had. But both my mother and my father have seperately observed that they get better results from hand-washing trousers than from a spin through the machine. Which is why I’m standing at the laundry sink washing clothes the old fashioned way. And it’s the anachronism that makes me persist.

I can’t remember when I last did my laundry this way. I think when I started working, I did my shirts, but shortly after I started travelling, I started sending out my work stuff to be laundered, and since coming home, I sometimes run my pants through the machine because they don’t need to be *that* pressed. (or I could iron them, I suppose, but… I find myself not caring so much right now)

And here I am, with a little bit of soapy water in the sink, lifting the long wet ribbon of clothing out of the water and listening to the rush of water running down and spilling off it. Here I am trying to match my own pace to the fall of the water, so that my cycle ends as the water falls to the sink (It sounds better that way). Here I am, pounding my clothes against a painted-steel rock, in a captive river. I like that part too.

Sometimes I wonder about these tendencies to manual effort. What draws me to them when there are so much easier, and honestly just as interesting ways to do things. Electric shaving is highly functional, it’s just more satisfying by hand. And washing in the sink, despite the splashes on my shirt and dripping down my arms as I raise the cloth, and the strain in my back because you don’t notice it at first but lifting wet things is work.

It’s oddly good time for philosophy. I spent my laundry time contemplating my masculinity, and not in the dangly bits sense. Had a conversation with former diarist Moonslark last week about doing manly things and my mind chewed on that concept for a while. But then as my back got more tired, I also started thinking about things like whether my parents had pulled a fast-one on me.

Not entirely intentionally, mind. It’s not that they’re wrong. But my dad’s trousers tend to wool. And ever since my favourite brand orphaned me, I’ve been going less wool and more supposedly wrinkle-free synthetics. Proof will be in the pudding, I guess. Or in the folding. And wrinkling.

But electricity costs more before dark making me feel guilty about running the washing machine. And I didn’t feel like waiting. And supposedly my pants would turn out nicer. And if not, it’s less wear than the machine puts on it.

So yeah. Entry about laundry. Makes you wish I was writing about something more interesting, huh. Suggestions?