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Got Them ol' Laundromat Blues
For many years, before "city water" came to my little community, our well went dry with the regularity of someone on Metamucil, forcing me to undertake the vile and loathsome chore of Laundromat Duty.
Now, this is similar in many ways to military K.P., however, there is no dog–faced drill sergeant pointing out a mountain of spuds waiting to be peeled. Instead, there are several children who have worn the same jeans for so long that one can stand them up in a corner for the night (the jeans, not the kids). Or there's a husband with a few tender words such as,
"Honey, dinner was great and the candles were a nice touch, but this is my last pair of clean BVDs."
My options at this point are few. Down to the creek to beat seventeen loads on a flat rock, or perhaps hire someone else to do the wash at a rate high enough to buy new wardrobes, or face the music and haul three week's worth of ripe laundry to the local Wash–a– teria.
Off I go. As usual, the bleach spills in the car and forms yet another pink amoebae–shaped blotch on our otherwise burgundy upholstery.
Upon arrival, like every time before, there is no one around when I need help schlepping the behemoth baskets through the door. Yet, like magic, as soon as I do, the place fills up while I play doorman for everyone else and my washers get pirated by a sweet little ninety–year–old who tells me she has only a few dainties to do.
Then, there is the question of etiquette. Should one introduce oneself to one's laundromat mates? Who speaks first? Should one speak at all, given the fact that the guy hypnotically watching his army blanket dry, is a dead ringer for Charles Manson out on a weekend pass and looking edgy?
I choose to talk to a five year old whose mother (the one smoking two Camels simultaneously and chugging a 32 oz. JOLT cola) snaps, "Don't talk to strange people!"
The first order of business (after the lady with my washers is finished with her dainties) is making change in the innocent looking dollar–changing machine where I spend the next 15 minutes in a battle of wills, flattening and re–flattening my bills, in hopes that the evil contraption will accept them and give me my quarters. (This can be very hard on those already suffering from low self esteem. One must try not to take it personally, it's your money that's being rejected, not you.)
When my wash is finally in, I realize I have left my book at home. How to amuse oneself for the next two hours? There's always the complimentary reading material, Newsweek, vintage 1983, pages stuck together with a gelatinous substance vaguely resembling FlufferNutter.
Eventually, my attention is diverted (thank you, Lord) by my machine lurching out of its place from the orderly line against the wall, like a soldier gone berserk—breaking ranks. I pretend I don't notice until all my `mat–mates have, in turn, mumbled "not mine."
I stand in front of it. Try to stare it down. There is nothing else to be done, of course, since it's one of those washers that, until it is finished, are sealed tighter than the lips of the folks who know the whereabouts of the WMD. Trying to push it back could be fatal, so I stare at it a while longer and mutter something astute like "stupid machine." (Make sure at least one of your `mat mates hears you, this absolves you from any further responsibility.)
The final indignation is the THIRTY SECOND WAITING PERIOD AFTER THE WASHER HAS STOPPED BEFORE YOU CAN OPEN THE DOOR rule. What could possibly happen if it's opened before the little red light goes out? One might be sucked in to some parallel universe, alarms and sirens would go off, immediate arrest and hard time?
"Laundromat police, you'll have to come with us, Ma"am."
Maybe, it's like those little tags on mattresses, simply a passive aggressive method of world domination and humbling of the masses. At any rate, we conform for the most part, and are obedient children.
But, not today. No sir, I won't be bullied any longer. As I give in to temptation and choke back my fear of becoming the next episode of Cops (even though I have all my own teeth, do not own a tank top and to the best of my knowledge, have never kept a python in my barn), I try the handle, in hopes that it will release my soggy clothing thirty seconds sooner than promised.
Oh, the joy! Thirty seconds stolen from the tyranny of automation… Imagine the possibilities.
©Gloria Slater
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Gloria Slater, an expatriated Floridian, is a writer living and freezing in western NY. Her essays have been published in The St. Petersburg Times, The Buffalo News, The Rochester D&C, Country Journal Magazine, as well as such online magazines as LaughterLoaf, and NightsAndWeekends. Her fiction and feature articles have been seen in Mockingbird Journal, Artsphere, WriterOnline, Flashquake, and Life in the Finger Lakes. She reports for the Mendon–Honeoye Falls–Lima Sentinel and she writes column called "My Front Porch" for the Discover Conesus and the Livingston County News (for which she won 2nd Place in the 2005 NY Press Association's Best Humor Column in her circulation category). Yet she somehow stays on the good side of the authorities and most close relatives. She promises never to refer to herself in the third person ever again.
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