L is for Laundry

Laundry is a never ending mystery to me. For a significant portion of my life, clothes magically found their way from my bedroom floor to the clothes line and then to my bed. Folded neatly and smelling great. It was heaven.

From the middle of high school however, my clothes seemed to prefer the floor. They rarely moved. School uniform was the most active, but other than that, the rest of them just sat there. I couldn't understand why they were suddenly so lazy. Then mother informed me I should try sticking them in the machine myself. So I did. And I failed. Miserably.

Somehow, things that were white ended up pink, or mauve, or slightly blue. A favourite woollen number shrunk and I was at a loss. What went wrong? I put them in the machine. I put in powder. I pressed start. Mother laughed at me. Apparently it's common knowledge that you don't put bright colours with whites in hot water. How was I to know?

I decided to do away with warm water all together. And I never mixed whites with colours. And I dared not touch anything woolly again, mother can deal with the hard stuff. I was confused, and not quite sure where to get the answers.

Was there a convention I missed for laundry? Did we cover this in class at all?

I still have yet to really understand the ins and outs of washing clothes. And I'm not sure if one day I'll be hit with a sudden heap of knowledge on the topic - maybe it's something you inherit? Either way, I'm not stressing. I'll throw it all in on cold, and if it's too hard, well then let's hope the laundromat across the road does discounts for the regulars.

Jess xoxo