Johnny Cash had a hit single, enumerating his discoveries
while walking down a Sunday morning sidewalk after a Saturday night of revelry.
The juxtaposition between the wholesomeness of small town Sundays and the
physical, emotional, and spiritual pangs of small town Saturday night bars are
palpable.
This is not that sort of story…
Sitting in a Laundromat at a time on Sunday morning when I should
have been sitting in church. I pay dis-interested attention to the parade of
other patrons lugging their plastic baskets or over-sized trash bags crammed
nearly to bursting through the single door.
The décor is a very accurate representation of 1960’s
vintage government office building. Neutral colored walls devoid of any type of
decoration to stimulate any visual or mental activity are complemented by 7
cold gray plastic chairs which have been endorsed by the American Chiropractic
Association; they are guaranteed to
throw out anyone’s back thus generating
business for the local bone-cracker.
Oh, being in a Laundromat isn’t so odd…it was a weekly
ritual my first 3 years of college. Even
after marrying my Lovely Bride, we still schlepped clothes, soap, and babies
off to the village’s one of 2 do-it-yourself facilities.
And, over the course of Life from time to time, when a
machine would take a dive and then give up the ghost, off we would go; over
loaded baskets in the trunk of the car and inevitably realizing after arriving
at the Laundromat the detergent was right where we left it by the front door.
So, it is not the fact our Whirlpool has opted to not spin,
nor the fact the fix-it-guy has a somewhat casual approach toward customer
service which is most disconcerting- it is being a sixty-something married
bachelor. Doing laundry on a Sunday morning when I should be in my regular spot
in the congregation.
I can’t take credit for the phrase “married bachelor”- in
fact it was uttered by the fix-it-guy during his “yup-it’s-the-clutch-I-don’t-have-the-part-have-to-wait-till-Monday”s
visit yesterday. I reluctantly accepted the truth of his words.
Oh, not the Dan Akroyd/Steve Martin “Wild and Crazy Guys”
type of bachelor. Nor the Lake Wobegon Norwegian bachelor farmer social misfit
immortalized by Garrison Keillor either.
I ticked through the list of notable bachelors in my mind.
I am neither the Felix Unger overly OCD neat-freak, nor the
Oscar Madison quintessential slob.
Definitely not the Jim Rockford, sports-car driving type.
Most people are put off by Bess, my 18 year old Jeep. She is the antithesis of
a four wheeled chick-magnet. She is more of a vehicular chick repellent,
actually.
I am most definitely not the sophisticated man-about-town,
lady on each arm type of bachelor.
No, I am nothing like any of the above.
I am…well… me. Married to LB, patiently and prayerfully
awaiting her recovery and return to our home.
Tomorrow, the 10th it will
be four months to the day that LB’s, my and our entire family’s lives were
inexorably altered. As of yet-with
dramatic physical and neurological progress on LB’s part aside-our lives are
still altered; with no end-date forecast.
All of which explains why I am sitting in this particular
place at this particular time. With work, caring for dogs and visiting LB,
Saturday and Sunday are the only times I can cram five days of household duties
into two.
So, I am up very early, cleaning, sweeping, watering plants,
feeding the backyard birds, grocery shopping, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera…
Usually, while I am performing the above, the washer and
dryer happily chug along, performing their tasks. Alas, for the past 10 or so
days now they have sat idle. Oh sure, the washer fills, agitates, drains and
repeats- it simply does not spin the water out.
Opening the lid reveals a sodden intermingled mass, not the
nicely damp centrifugal force arrayed items; eagerly awaiting a spin in the
dryer. I am thereby faced with some options:
11) Wringing the wet items out by hand, hoping the
majority of water actually makes it to the sump,
22) Loosely drape the dripping things over step
ladders and odds and ends of stuff, allowing the water to run willy-nilly on
the laundry room floor, in the hopes the majority actually makes it to the
sump,
33) Say “forget it”, toss the drenched, dripping
pile en mass inside the dryer, set that sucker on Turbo
Dry, and hope for the best.
None of the above is a truly satisfactory solution. I have
tried them all. All more than once. The only real solution, aside from popping
for a new machine, was to call the fix-it guy.
We have used him for close to 20 years now. He used to be
more responsive, willing to stop at night on his way home from his last
appointment. Now… he has slowed down more than just a bit. His primary concern
after his last appointment now seems to be getting home to dinner.
When once all it took was one phone message and he would be
at the door, it now takes a couple messages, one or two conversations,
re-hashing the ills of the World and all who are in it, and then hoping he
doesn’t forget we even talked.
It is really sad to see how far down the hill the poor guy
has slid. Sure glad none of that has happened to me.
So, here I am….in the Laundromat, shaking my head in
amazement that it now takes as much money to start one machine as would have
washed and dried 2 full loads when I was in college all the while trying to ignore the
gentle guidance of a mother to her child;”What the *&^% are you
doing?! You can’t fit in the washing
machine!”
With a wistful smile on my face, I think:
I sure hope the fix-it guy can find the part. And he
remembers to show up.