They Can't Take that Away from Me

Alright, it has been awhile since I have written in this blog, but I have become so enraged over an incident that I felt it worthy to write! It's a complete dismissal of the first law of laundry etiquette entitled "Don't touch my shit!" Every Sunday seems to be laundry day for the entire dormitory. It's like one of those last weekend errands. Something you need to do but don't want to do, and you don't have time during the week to do it. Thus Sunday it becomes next to impossible to do your laundry in the Bartlett Hall basement. Unfortunately and against my better judgment, I was among the procrastinators of the weekend, and I left my laundry for Sunday afternoon. I lugged my laundry bag down the flights of stairs to eerie basement. A man had just gotten off of the elevator with his duffel bag turned laundry bag. We nearly collided at the laundry door. Since he had his key to the laundry room ready to go (mine was buried in my pocket because I was carrying detergent and an awkward laundry bag with no handles down stairs, not living the cushy life within an elevator with a handle-friendly duffel bag!), I moved out the way to let him open the door. I think it would have been rude on my part to stand there awkwardly fumbling for my key making him wait there. As we entered the laundry room, there was only one washing machine available. Like the perfect gentlemen, he took it for himself without muttering a word. Defeated, I returned to my room with the intention of trying again later. This was a usual occurrence, so I wasn't too surprised or upset for that matter. About an hour later, I returned to find two washers available. What luck? I loaded my clothes into both machines, set them for thirty minutes, and returned to my dorm room with a skip in my step. I had defeated the odds and found a machine on a Sunday afternoon. Now, when I do my laundry, I am very attentive. I don't leave my clothes in dryer for an hour after they've completed their cycle. I time myself very precisely. Thus after 30 minutes, I returned to the basement in hopes that luck would prevail, and a dryer would be waiting for me. I knew it might be an epic battle, so I brought a book with me in order to claim my dryer stake when the opportunity presented itself. When you enter the laundry room, you can immediately see the multitude of dryers on the wall facing you. They are front-loading dryers with what I assume is plexiglass covers, so it's easy to determine the ones being used. The washers are on the opposite wall and require you to fully enter the room to see if they are available. When I first entered, to my dismay, I saw no available dryer. However, some of them had stopped their spinning, and I imagined that the owners would soon be down to collect their clean, dry clothes. I decided to then stick around and wait for a dryer to become available. When I fully entered the room though, I saw a pile of wet clothes placed on one of the washers I was using. It wasn't only a pile of wet clothes, it was a pile of MY wet clothes!! Immediately, I welled with anger. (Note: it's an unfortunate coincidence that this happens to be a time of the month when I tend to easily well up with anger.) Never in my life had I wanted revenge so badly. I threw a chair in front of my commandeered washing machine, and I sat and listened to gurgling of the machine. A million ideas ran through my mind of what I would do to these clothes. They ranged from simple ideas such as merely turning the machine off before the rinse cycle, to complex ideas such as moving the clothes to a different washing machine and turning it on again, in hopes that the assailant would believe their clothes to be stolen, create a huge fuss and inform someone, and then become the ultimate fool when their clothes are simply in a different machine. I sat there with my ideas. My book was open, but my mind was elsewhere. My eyes scanned the entire room for a bottle of bleach. I heard a key twisting in the door. The kindly gentlemen whom I had met earlier entered to remove some clothes from one of the dryers. All vengeful thoughts began to melt away as I saw a dryer becoming available. As I sat there watching him trying not to smile. When he had emptied the dryer, he made his way to one of the washers and began refilling the dryer with a new load. My hopes shattered, and my vengeful nature sought yet another victim. Since he had not ultimately insulted me, I only thought of turning the dryer off and letting his wet clothes sit, but also in this incident, I had no intention of actually fulfilling. My mind fluttered back to the gurgling washer behind me, and my rage again ensued as I waited for a dryer. Another man entered and in the same respect as the man before, emptied a dryer and refilled it with a new load. I hated life. I hated people. I hated laundry. Then a girl entered. She began unloading a dryer. I again took notice in hopes that I would be the next to claim it. When she finished taking her clothes out, she began to approach me. In confusion, I feigned interest in my book and pretended to take no notice of her. Then she reached around me to unload the washer behind me, the washer that had been taken from me. As she walked with an armful of wet clothes putting them in the dryer, I reaffirmed my position in front of the machine while giving her the dirtiest look I believe I have ever mustered. Back and forth she went, reaching around me and loading her dryer. The entire time before, when I had been scheming, my conscience was in a great debate. The devil on my shoulder had some brilliant ideas, but the angel only repeated the fact that it's Easter. Of all the holidays, it had to be Easter. It had to be the day that Christ was resurrected after dying for OUR sins which I'm sure included revenge. The case was settled. The angel on my shoulder had the winning argument. As the girl continued with her laundry, I wanted her to say something to me. I begged her to say something to me. If she instigated anything at all, even an eye roll or a reciprocal dirty look, all bets were off. My conscience would have declared a mistrial, and I wouldn't be denied. She remained silent though and after setting her dryer settings, left. I instantly began fuming again. On Easter, I was helpless. I continued to think of ways to sabotage her laundry, but it was futile now. I knew that I wouldn't do anything. A dirty look, that's all I got. More time passed, and then another girl entered. She went to a dryer and began unloading it. Rather than throwing all of her clothes into her basket and leaving, she folded every article meticulously like a shop girl in the Gap before placing it into her basket. I couldn't be mad anymore. My anger had already reached its pinnacle and was subsiding. My disbelief in humanity continued the uphill battle. To the unsuspecting person, I'm just a girl sitting in front of a washing machine with a pile of wet clothes behind her, clearly waiting for a dryer. My time doesn't matter to them though. No one's time matters to them. They only matter to themselves. People are selfish, even on the holy days. Nothing stops their conceit. Back to the actual perspective of this situation, I eventually dried my clothes. I threw both loads into one dryer although I could feel they were almost dry anyway. In the end, it took me four hours to do 1 1/2 loads of laundry. The moral of the story: don't do laundry on Sunday and people suck.