Suds and snacks and such

After too many months of babysitting my washing machine and having to be at the ready to rush in to straighten unbalanced loads my husband and I finally made the leap of faith and purchased a front-loading high efficiency washing machine and matching dryer.  I couldn’t wait for my him to finish the installation so I could start a load to see what the thing could do.  

I loaded the machine with kitchen towels and pushed all the tweeting buttons to get it started.  The settings buttons ting-a-ling like Mario catching coins, and at the end of the cycle I get a little song.  Considering my machine is Korean I thought Gangnam Style would have been a good choice, but the folks at Samsung thought otherwise.

My husband and I stood there in front of the machine and watched through the glass porthole as the machine rocked the towels to and fro.  Finally it added a splash of water and the wash cycle began.  We stood there watching, and waiting for something spectacular to happen, the towels turning and dropping and turning and dropping.  There is nothing spectacular about laundry, yet the expectation remained.

For a split second I seriously thought about pulling up a stool and watching for awhile, but the season finale of Downtown Abbey was calling me, and Maggie Smith’s quips and quotable quotes are more entertaining than towels, so, quid pro quo, Downtown won out over Downy.  

I think the reason watching my towels drop and turn is so mesmerizing is because it gives me a weird comforting feeling of childhood time wasted in a Laundromat.  For many years my mother did not own a clothes dryer; everything was hung on the line to dry.  There was no privacy in those days.  Every neighbor or passenger in a passing car who could look over into the back yard could see what color under-wares were worn that week.  There were always two risks involved in every load pinned on the line; the chance of rain, and the greater chance of being chased by our rooster, Carol.  I remember watching my Granny on many occasions trek out the backdoor with a basket of clothes under one arm  and a broomstick under the other to fight off the Rhode Island Red. That would be Carol the rooster, not Gertrude, my aunt from Providence.

Yes, laundry was hung on a line to dry in the sunshine.  But the sun doesn’t shine everyday, and there were times when the washing machine needed repair, so it was often necessary to visit a Laundromat.  The one we went to most often was on Hardy Street, next to Winn Dixie.  The Laundromat trips were dreaded, there wasn’t much to do.  If I think about what it felt like to be there I immediately think of being so bored I had to be drug around like a rag doll, and I think of the smell of overheated cotton.  It’s a little sad to think about comparing time spent with my mother to boredom and burnt linens, but such was life.  

Those days were only made palatable because of the treats my mother would buy (bribe) me to keep me quiet.  On a good day she would give me money for the vending machines and I could get a Coke.  I was rarely allowed a Coke, not because she thought they were bad for me, it was just that Coke was not a pantry staple like it is today.  Cokes were for special days or sick days.  Back then Cokes came out of vending machines in glass bottles and you had two choices, short or tall.   They tasted different, you know they did, and I was only allowed a short one.  On a bad day I had to get a Sprite.  The only thing I liked about Sprite was the green dimpled bottle and watching the bubbles.  It was my mother who liked Sprite, and if she bought one for me it was an excuse for her not to have to buy another for herself. 

The other special treat was a bag of Bugles.  A tube of peanuts was the norm (for the Coke, of course), but Bugles were my weakness.  Again, chips or any snacks were not the norm in our house, and those little cone shaped salty, corny tid-bits were heavenly.  Of course I would nibble off the end and blow on them like real bugles, or stick them on the tips of my fingers to make long, witchy fingernails. 

To pass the time I liked to look under the machines for fallen change.  Sometimes a dime or a nickel was just within reach or sometimes they had to be fished out along with all of the grime and lint buildup under the machine.  Had it not been for the Coke, Bugles and crawling around the dirty floor looking for loose change those long afternoons in the hot Laundromat would have been intolerable.

Now I have a machine that sings to me and a free 2 liter Coke from my favorite Chinese take-out restaurant sitting on my counter.  I wonder what my mother would think of my tinkling washing machine that can wash six pairs of jeans with one cup of water.  I don’t think she would approve of the high efficiency, but I bet she would pull up a chair and watch the load for awhile.  If God would give me an hour of her time I’d buy her a case of Sprite and a jumbo bag of Bugles for the show.  But, such is life.