Watchin' the Washers
I’ve pretty much come to grips with the fact that I probably won’t be buying another house before I head up to my own mansion in the sky. I don’t mind living in a small apartment. The only complaint I have is the weekly trip to the laundromat. I will admit though, one can tell an awful lot about a person just by observing their laundry habits.
While I’m at our local Washday Station, I look around at all the people enjoying their Saturday afternoon just like I am. Some are more tolerant of the excursion than others. Take for instance the lonely man standing by his dryer. I’m guessing he’s probably a widower. He stands and watches as his socks chase the same towel over and over again. He has nothing to do but stand and stare. I sense his loneliness and I’m almost compelled to go ask him out for coffee.
Next a woman pulls up to the door in an SUV. She and three teenage boys hop out and begin unloading her laundry in huge trash bags. I swear this woman has stockpiled an entire year of dirty clothes! She comes in and lays claim to probably eight out of ten of the washing machines in a total aisle. I’ll bet she’s one of those selfish, aggressive drivers I was talking about in my Road Rage story!
On the other side of her is a woman with her adult son. (Either that or she’s an old cougar with her cub). I can tell right away that she is a very organized, possibly controlling ‘clean freak.’ She’s come equipped with laundry soap, dryer sheets, stain remover, hangers and bleach. They have quite the system going. As she pretreats the already glistening white crew socks, she hands them to her boy cub who then places them carefully into the washer (Meanwhile, I’m unrolling wads of mismatched socks and pulling crushed cigarettes out of my kids’ pockets).
A few machines down stands a woman with her three small children. I can only assume from her demeanor that she would rather be DEAD than here doing laundry. She pulls piles and piles of ragged, torn clothing out of the dryers and crams them into her broken, plastic baskets. Her hair hangs in her face as she tries to keep her clothes from falling out of the dryer onto the dirty floor. Her children are running and screaming through the aisles, playing bumper cars with the rolling carts. They run into the man standing at the dryer so she motions for them to all go and sit in the back. They hound her mercilessly for change to play the arcade game. She reluctantly gives them money for one can of soda and the last stale bag of chips in the vending machine.
Finally I can see guys here and there each doing their own clothes. One man has greasy, grimy overalls and just crams them all into one washer. I don’t know if he even added detergent. He turns the knob, closes the lid and leaves. I guess he doesn’t want to bask in the excitement like the rest of us. The other guy is obviously some kind of metal thrashing rocker. He has nothing but jeans and black hoodies with heavy metal bands on every one of them. His black tee shirts are riddled with pictures of pot leaves or middle fingers. I’m thinking he’s either single or a guy still home with his mom who probably told him to “get all this laundry done once and for all – or get out!”
As I put my load of clothes into the dryer I feed in the final stash of quarters. I’m thinking one quarter might just buy me six minutes of heat time. What a rip off! I try and find something to read to pass the time so I’m not just staring at my clothes going around and around like Mr. Lonely over there. The only reading materials on hand are the automobile sales magazines and a weekly jobs newspaper. There’s nothing but ads for medical assistants and a few lonely hearts classifieds. Here’s one or two from Madam Z who will read your tarot cards and tell you your future for a small fee.At the bottom of the ad it says "Your future is about to become brighter!" Wait. What do we have here? In the miscellaneous section it reads:
For Sale – compact, apartment sized washing machine.
Needs no special wiring. Hooks up to kitchen sink.
Hmm. I’m beginning to think this trip to the laundromat just might be my last! How right you were Madam Z, how right you were.
From the book "Even God Hates Spinach" available on amazon
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00YI1VEI4
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