Everyday Canvas

Laundry!

Prompt: Laundry
“I've buried a lot of my laundry in the back yard,” said Phyllis Diller
Does doing the laundry annoy you? What is it about laundry that scares so many people in this day and age when appliances do the job?
Or Write a story or a poem on the subject, if you wish.

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Dirt, stain, and odors. Ugh! Try removing them! Yet, why complain? In our day, human ingenuity, advances in technology, and societal change has taken care of the tedious, mundane nature of this somewhat disgusting task.

Historically, laundry was a process done by hand by a group of people, and mostly women (no surprise there!) Then, in ancient Rome, no one did the laundry at home for they had large public facilities where the wash was soaked in water and cleansed in urine (a natural ammonia, eek!), and rinsed and wrung out to be spread out over clean surfaces to dry. If you wish you can search using the name fullonica, as those facilities were called.

Then, what I wrote so far is only a very short version of this info on the web. Here are a couple of URLs.

https://eaglesanddragonspublishing.com/ancient-everyday-pee-and-laundry-in-the-r...

https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/SMIGRA/*Fullo.html

Then, during the Middle Ages, women took over the chore, totally. This time they used animal by-products and sticks to beat out the dirt. But the fun part was that it was a communal activity, a party really, with women exchanging news and gossip as they worked by a river or any other water source.

Well, so much for the origins of laundry. If I read more about it, I think I might get sick, so I'm very glad and thankful to those who came up with today's machines and made our lives so much the better.

in a room of suds and spins
clothes twirl, a dance begins
water whispers, fabrics play
laundry rules my busy day

detergents dream, bubbles rise
colors mingle, my rainbow prize
hum of machines, some rhythmic song
laundry's symphony all along

folding the warmth in my embrace
scents and softness with fresh trace
from a chaos to a neat array
to laundry's theme I can sway


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