Monday, June 1, 2009

The Clothesline

I want a clothesline. I really, really want a clothesline. While I completely understand that this...desire...makes me a nerd of the highest order and deletes any "cool housewife" points I may have accidentally acquired, I still want a clothesline.

I first broached the subject with Chad last summer. The temperature was hovering in the low 100's and I had to do laundry. It took forty minutes for our dryer to finish a load, at which time, I could have baked cookies in the garage. It was that hot.

He hemmed and hawed and made noises about dust and stiff clothes. I let it drop, but by the end of summer, renewed my goal of getting a clothesline.

This year, I'm hitting the ground running. It's May and I've already broached the subject three times - including a post on Facebook that had Chad shaking his head. I need him to buy into the idea since, at least for a couple of weeks, he'll be doing a lot of the laundry.

Chad doesn't like the "look" of a clothesline. He does have a small, tiny little point. Our yard in minuscule. A regular clothesline would take up too much valuable space. Space that can be used for other things...like green beans.

He's worried about dust. Again, he has an itsy bitsy little point. Our back fence lines a horse pasture (weird in the middle of town, yes?) and by mid-summer, we're hard-pressed to keep our patio set clean.

He's worried about stiff clothes. Well...nothing a little fabric softener can't fix.

He did offer to compromise and hang a line in the garage. But seriously...it would take longer for the clothes to dry without air flow and the humidity level of the garage would be insane.

To solve the first problem, I found this. Seriously...how cool is this sucker. I have to give a big thank you to my mother-in-law for turning me this direction.

As for the dust, with a retractable clothesline, we can hang our clothes closer to the front of the house, a whole tree away from the horses. That should counteract the dust.

Overall...I think I'm going to buy it, install it and let Chad see the dollars come off our gas and electric bill.

Even if it does make me a domestic nerd.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

i love clotheslines.
there is something about snapping wrinkles out of wet clothes and clipping them to a clothesline.
i didn't have a dryer until my girls were out of diapers... and we lived in grover beach where the foggy summers never dried the diapers entirely... but i loved the "nerdiness" of my clothes basket and my bag of clothespins.
having an clothesline that retracts would be good - especially for those days the family is out in the yard... although - my girls loved the days i washed sheets (king size bed then) and they walked through the sheets as they were drying... there's nothing like the smell of sheets warmed by the hot sun.
and - you can always use the dryer for some items (chad can do his own laundry and dry it); or for those days that you just don't have time for hanging the stuff out...
my vote is "give it a try"
oh - and i was very nerdy... i hated having anyone help me hang the clothes out because i wanted the clothes to be perfectly hung so it looked like they came out of a dryer...
i use a wooden drying rack still... in fact - i left a pair of jeans on the rack overnight last night - oops...
chris

Heather T - sloCooking said...

I LOVE my clothes line. Right now I'm just using a regular rope, but bought an "old school" round one that looks like an upside down umbrella. Our dryer is electric, and I saw a HUGE difference last summer by drying clothes on the line. The only things I'd run in the dryer are 1) towels - nothing worse than a stiff towel, and 2) jeans - also another item that gets too stiff on the line. But everything else... Line Dry Baby!