Laundry Day

xposted around, but originally here: http://puttputtproductions.com/blogetary/2010/08/16/laundry-day/

I don't love doing laundry or laundry day, but once you get into it,there is a Zen-ness to it, at least for me. I don't attain that Zen-ness when doing dishes or scrubbing the toilet, but I get it when doing laundry.

Laundry is a funny thing. People get very particular about their laundry where they won't be particular about anything else. The sorting- by color? by material type? by function? The cleaner - soap or detergent? without or without perfumes? Fabric softener or no? Laundry sheet in dryer or not? Or does one hang to dry instead? And then there's the folding. Does one just toss ones underwear and socks somewhere? Or is there a particular way to fold them? What about hanging clothes? How are they hung properly? Wire hangers? Plastic hangers? Wood? Padded? Which are hung and which are folded? And what about sheets and towels and blanket?

You don't really think about how you do laundry, but once you do,you realize how pretty particular you are about how you do your laundry as opposed to say how a roommate or friend or partner does their laundry. It becomes a ritual, but not a day long ritual (well,depending on the size of family you have).

And that's not really surprising. Laundry is easier these days, but we still think of it as something that takes up a large chunk of time.But about 100 years ago, laundry didn't take just an afternoon at the laundromat or an evening watching movies and switching things over in the laundry room or basement. It took all day and included washing and scrubbing and boiling and rinsing and hanging to dry, sometimes to freeze dry out in the snow even. I remember when I was a kid, - 40years ago - my gramma used lye soap and a wringer washing machine and that had made washing the clothes that much faster, but still was notas fast as the "new" agitator washers with regular laundry detergent.It was a big day when she got one of those.

So, it was really interesting, recently, when my mom found a crumbling piece of paper that was a "receet" (back then they called recipes "receipts") for doing laundry handed down from my great-great grandmother to my great-grandmother (my grampa's mother) we think. Mom decided to type it up and pass it out to the family so we'd get a kick as to what's changed between then and now.

To give it some perspective time-wise, my grampa was born in 1909(?) and he was the baby of the family and I think his oldest sister was probably 15 when he was born (?). So, this "receet" was probably originally written up between 1890-1895 by a woman who had been born in the 1830s - maybe?

Below is what I got from my mom:

Mom and/or Dad had two copies of this in their things. I think probably it was Dad.

It is a "Grandmother's Receet"...for washing clothes, given to "mymother as a bride ...Kent" (Kentucky?) The paper is dry and crumblingaway so I am copying it for posterity.

1. bild fire in back yard to het kettle of rain water.
2. set tubs so smoke wont blow in eyes if wind is pert.
3. shave 1 hole cake lie sope in biling water.
4. sort things. Make 3 piles. 1 pile white. 1 pile cullord. 1 pile werk briches and rags.
5. stur flour in cold water to smooth, then thin down with biling water.
6. rub dirty spots on board. Scrub hard, then bile.
7. rub cullord but don't bile just rench and starch.
8. take white things out of kettle with broom stick handle then rench, blew and starch.
9. spread tee towels on grass.
10. hang old rags on fence.
11. pour rench water on flower bed.
12. scrub porch with hot sopy water. (One says "scrub privee seat and floor with sopy water caught from porch scrub".)
13. turn tubs upside down.
14. go put on cleen dress—smooth hair with side combs, brew cup of tee—set and rest a spell and count blessings.


Kind of offers up some perspective. Makes me think a lot about chopping wood and carrying water and reading more Brother Lawrence and Thich Nhat Hanh.