I trudge my dirty laundry through the street. I try to make the awkward hold of my laundry basket look effortless. This? Yes, it’s my dirty laundry. Yes, in public. Yes. [avoids eye contact]
I continue down the block. I eye the street corner, hope for the <Walk> sign so I don’t have to stand there, waiting, holding, eyes averting.
I arrive. I wait.
I cross the block, make a left. Finally: the laundromat.
I timed it well today. I’ve learned my lesson. Weekends at the laundromat are a no-go. Too many of us have the same idea. You have to wait for a washer. And again for a dryer. Who has that kind of time?
This is why people pay someone to do their laundry for them.
To avoid the trudging, yes, but mostly to avoid the waiting. The empty time you can’t spend doing anything else.
But today, there’s just one other person—the owner—who doesn’t acknowledge I’m there. It’s fine. One less set of eyes on my dirty laundry.
I load, I pour, I select a temperature. I wait.
I crack open the book I brought.
I close the book; open my phone. Snap a photo. Send it to a friend. Send it to my mom.
Glamorous, I say.
Necessary, my mom says.
A luxury, my friend replies.
I smile. They’re right. This empty time is both: necessary and a luxury.
And so, I fill it with story ideas and Notes on my phone.
And wash away the shame of the matter. Yes, it’s a gift, this time to myself. Despite the unglamorous circumstances.
After I’ll walk home with my head held higher.
This laundry? It’s clean. Folded. Tidy.
The ideas in my head, in my phone, less so. But that’s the process; the inevitable. What’s now clean will get dirty again. And I’ll be back to repeat the cycle.
Supplemental reading: The Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter (s/o to my dear friend Gwen who first recommend it to me)
TL;DR: Hard things are good for you. And modern-day humans, but mostly Americans, have grown so comfortable with avoiding the hard things. In turn, our lifestyles are harming us.
Not to say a traipse to the laundromat is hard, per se. But it’s the intentional choices to face the hard things—turn inward; reflect on what’s causing mental friction—that will make us healthier in the long run.