Laundry Day

Where Heather dries clothes in a new old way

Over the Valley of Sartorial Death

I don’t know about anyone else, but I have never felt like an adult, ever. Yet here I am, in my 50’s; clearly I don’t fit into any of the not-an-adult categories that I am aware of, therefore, I must be an adult. Disconcerting at times, to be honest. Now that Jim and I have picked up and moved to Spain (well, sort of, we’re still waiting for the consulate to get back to us), I do feel weirdly more comfortable with what my current category seems to be, i.e., ex-pat fish out of water/neophyte.

For starters, let’s talk about laundry. Exciting subject, I know!

My Mom (hi Mom!) taught my brother and I how to use the washer and dryer and fold clothes, some ironing, and all that jazz when we were kids. Been doing it ever since, and I have Feelings on various aspects of the process (example: if I never see the inside of another laundromat, I will be perfectly fine with that - I’m completely 100% over having weird strangers walk in, strip to their birthday suits, start their wash and then try to make conversation with the one person (me) waiting for her clothes to finish drying.) And ironically, considering what the rest of this entry is about, I’ve always held a self-righteous sense of outrage about HOA’s that ban any sort of line drying, especially those in properties where there are no laundry hookups in the units nor communal laundry rooms on site. It seems I almost always have a couple of things that should not see the inside of a dryer, that these things are very common (meaning that everyone or almost everyone else probably has them, too), and HELLO HOA BOARD, none of us are drying dripping sweaters in the middle of our living rooms. Or in the (seemingly) 2sq. foot bathroom, either.

Well, over here in Spain, dryers are a rarity. I knew this before we arrived, and I knew that I was about to get some serious education by trial on line drying not just my “delicates”, but every stinking thing I wash.

And it has begun. We’ve been here for just under a week, and it’s hot and much more humid than the SF Bay Area. (We managed to arrive not only in the summer, but at the beginning of a heat wave as well.) Add in that we are walking all over the place as we explore the area and run errands, and whew, one gets rather, um, damp! So, there will be regular washing - at the moment at least, I won’t be able to extend out how many times we can wear things before they need a good cleaning.

I had done some internet and Pinterest research on line drying, and the hippy homesteading crew out there gave me some great tips I hadn’t considered before. My line drying game is about to step up!

Things I learned (that maybe you know - remember my first paragraph up there?) include giving the clothes a good “snap”/shake out before hanging to make ironing less needed, turning them inside out (especially if they are dark colors) to prevent fading (rather, to prevent the side that the world sees from fading!), hanging dark clothes or delicate clothes in the shade (this will only be possible here in the morning as our line sits in the afternoon sun), and hanging them from the bottom hems if they are shirts, and waistbands if they are pants.

But there was also some chatter about the downsides of line drying - stiffness, and losing clothing if it falls off the line.

Stiffness can be reduced evidently by putting some white vinegar in the wash, but this tip was more challenging than it sounded - I have looked for white vinegar for several days now (casually for a day or two, and more intensely over the past couple of days as our laundry was starting to pile up). Finally we caved in and bought fabric softener, which I’ve never used before as an adult. (I may have used it as a child, I can’t remember if Mom used to use it? Perhaps she will comment…)

As for clothing falling off the line, I asked a friend here about line drying and it boils down to being friendly with your downstairs neighbor(s), and possibly attaching some sort of ID to your clothing (at least those pieces you really want back the most). Good advice, this, but no one lives on our ground floor here and I have yet to discover any sort of access and suspect that it may be through one of the storefronts on either side of us. That’s not ideal, since one of them has a “for rent” sign in the window and I’m not sure if the other one actually has a tenant in it or not. I’ve definitely not seen any signs of life there so far over the past week.

Also, there’s this:

How does anyone even get in there?

Way down there is… rubble. I’m talking dirt, bricks, broken shards of roof tiles, chunks of concrete. You can also see my maiden load of laundry there - so far, success! I was not brave enough to hang the pants as the homesteading influencer crowd advised - I don’t have a lot of pants, and I hate clothes shopping with a passion, so to lose a pair would be traumatic.

I’ve since run two more loads and so far all is good. I’m mostly being super deliberate while I’m hanging and removing the clothes, and using 1 ½ to 2 times more clothes pins than what I see my neighbors using.