Laundry dungeon

We are newlyweds who are certainly not basking in the lap of luxury. We are learning to make ends meet, learning to trust God throughout the process, and making decisions about how our family thinks these things through! I love the learning, I don’t love the uncertainty. But meanwhile, we make the most of our rickety (but not too rickety) little apartment, with it’s random pink kitchen tiles, complete lack of kitchen storage, leftover paint smell, no dishwasher, no w/d, and NO (and I mean nada)- little porch/deck/veranda/balcony/etc.

And yet, we totally love it for all it’s imperfections, yes we accept it’s subpar color choices, it’s displeasuring scent (we’ve eliminated most with the volcano candles…thank you, anthropologie), lack of kitchen storage with borrowed (and cute) cabinets…we’ve become dishwashing junkies and ready for any dish challenge ever (even when the garbage disposal backs up and I have to pour bleach down it. I mean what’s soo bad about the smell of bleach filling your lungs and making you cough??). We’ve even gotten used to the no deck nonsense, assuring ourselves that someday we’ll have a shpot to bbq, tan, eat, etc.

But there is one thing that I cannot shake. That I continue to try and convince myself is totally OK, workable, just fine, and I cringe…I can even hear myself now saying- it’s manageable. BUT the one thing that is totally not manageable, totally un…fine, in no way has it been workable, and goshdarnit it’s nowhere near the pitiful, pathetic and paltry aforementioned OK.

And that is the washer and dryer issue. I call it the washer and dryer issue, because it has to do with the washer and dryer, and the fact that there’s an issue– I’d say I have a big bone to pick. Our laundry room (located near the courtyard of our cute little six-apt complex) is kind of like a morgue, full of sadness and lifelessness.

The door (if you’d even call it that) isn’t one of those doors that reaches all the way to the ground. No, it’s one of those that got shorted at the lumber yard, or by the door-builder-person, and it comes up about four inches off the ground. Perfect for people to get through- oh wait, NO, we don’t fit…only other things that are little and yucky and nibble and I’m sure they live there.

As you walk in, you see a sad, sad, sad old washer/dryer set, filled with dust and anger. They welcome you into a room of dark and dank. No windows. No light, per se, just a small lightbulb that operates on a timer- because if you keep it on too long, I’m sure it would run up the electrical bill, that stinky little lightbulb and it’s big electrical bulb bill. Then. THEN. You see it. The “exhibit”. Two lonely machines stand side by side, one washing, one…drying. They’re old. They’re fed up. And they’re covered in dirt. Just plain dirty. And they’re COIN OPERATED. Ugh! Are you serious? Some crazy person wants me to pay them to use their stinky, yucky-ucky, LAME-o machines. And I’m not biting. I never will. I’m embarrassed for that person. I blush even now for you…you, person.

As a result, we wash & we dry throughout the county- at my mom’s, sometimes at the church, when we house-sit, for our friends who see our boo-hoo-ing and want to support. And for that, people, we love you.

One day, you can come to our future large, spacious, clean laundry room with well-proportioned doors and windows, light and maybe even accent lighting because we can. I’ll even take your picture so the memory lasts longer. Cause that’s what our laundry room will be.

A flipping tourist attraction of joy and soap.