Lighten Your Load

When Noah was about five he started asking me this question "Mom, if you could have a robot that did any job you wanted it to, what would you like it to do?" Don't ask me where this came from. It just arrived one day and has never left. Now, at nearly ten, he still asks it on a regular basis and is genuinely delighted by my answer, even though it never changes - "Laundry."
It is the bane of my existence. I teach the kids not to use the word "Hate", but this is an exception. I HATE it. I loath it. I despise it. Any evil thought you can think about something I think it about laundry. Laundry, I spit on you. I curse you to the heavens. I seeth at your very existence, and yet, you still come back for more. You have to give laundry that, it's got tenacity.

I had a brief Laundry Enlightenment this summer when we put up our first clothesline and I relished standing outside to hang it and watching it dry free from electricity and pollution. I have to admit that air-dried clothes smell so wonderful that you can forgive them their stiff and scratchy nature. I even loved the line-dried towels. I think they are excellent exfoliators. But now that the days are too cold and short to dry mass quantities of laundry outdoors, and our basement is too damp, and our attic is too cold, I am back to being a basket case about this, most dreaded, of chores. I do make use of some racks, but it's not the same. It really isn't.
This is one of those situations where you really need to look for something to feel joyful about. The one glimmer of hope I can find in this textile mess is trying to get the job done with the least of most of energy. Not my energy, but the kind that comes from my appliances. After some experimenting a few years back, I realized that I could get things dry even when I set the dryer to the "Light/Delicate" setting. As long as the load isn't too big, it gets the job done. Likewise, the various setting on my washer display the time that the load will take and I try to go for the shortest wash time. If the stain ain't out in 42 minutes, another 9 are not going to make a difference. The washer and dryer are both Energy Star rated and the washer is a top-loader, but is HE (high efficiency). In addition to dialing down on the power drain, I also use about half the detergent that is recommended (do have to use HE deterg, though) and I pass on the fabric softener and dryer sheets. So overall, I try to minimize the amount of resources that this life-sucking, plague of a job, domestic requirement uses up.

I now also set the dishwasher to "Light Load" which is nearly 30 minutes shorter than the regular cycle. Turning the dial down, unplugging when not in use, flipping the switch to off, and other small adjustments can add up to big savings on both cash and energy. It is through these simple steps that we can try to apply a tourniquet to the hemorrhaging of energy that plagues our everyday lives. The future that I look forward to, is not the Jetson's super-tech flying highway, but one in which there is more quiet and simplicity in the way we accomplish the tasks of everyday living. Although, if I could slap a solar panel on the top of  Rosie, the Robo-Maids head, I would totally make her my laundry whench.