Last week I attended a conference in Minneapolis. During the introductions one of the speakers asked, as an icebreaker, how many of us attendees hung our clothes on a clothesline. I was actually embarrassed not to raise my hand. Back home in Cherokee we actually kept a load of clothes on the line from dawn till dusk most days with exception to bad weather. For the family we were saving the costs of electricity, and unknowingly being environmentally conscious.
The smell of fresh sun dried towels lingers in my senses. After a shower you held the towel to your face and took a breath before drying yourself. Newly dried bed sheets that recently flapped in the summer breeze naturally odorized the room with the quality aroma often purchased by city folks in the fragrance departments of fancy stores. Just recently I noticed you could buy a candle labeled “sun dried linen.” For a mere twenty dollars you too can fill your house with that memorable fragrance.
It was always a challenge for me to figure out how to hang the various garments and laundry items on the line. Everyone had an opinion on the proper way to hang a shirt and it seems a shirt hung differently from a blouse. Sheets were my favorite to hang since you simply lay them across two lines and applied the pins, not very difficult. On a good summer day I don’t believe it took any longer for clothes to dry on the line than it does in a modern dryer today. Maybe the memory has distorted my internal clock.
Mom would send us out to gather the clothes soon after they were deemed dry in fear of a frequent Southern summer shower. As I gathered the clothes into the basket I would spread the clothes pins out to have them ready for the next round. It wasn’t fun to try and hold a garment while reaching down the line to find a clothes pin.
Today Mom continues to use her clothes line no different than my early days in Cherokee. I am willing to bet Mom’s clothes dryer doesn’t spin a half dozen times each year. Those of you who seem appalled at exposing your clothing on a line today probably haven’t really experienced the pleasure of sun dried linen.
Back at the conference I glanced around the room to see who would raise their hand in an auditorium full of engineering professionals. Two people raised their hands to the snicker of others in the room. Later that day we discussed the benefits of solar energy and how we can implement cost savings. If only they realized we already discussed one of the best uses of solar energy that began long before we even discovered the oil that fuels most of our vehicles.
The smell of fresh sun dried towels lingers in my senses. After a shower you held the towel to your face and took a breath before drying yourself. Newly dried bed sheets that recently flapped in the summer breeze naturally odorized the room with the quality aroma often purchased by city folks in the fragrance departments of fancy stores. Just recently I noticed you could buy a candle labeled “sun dried linen.” For a mere twenty dollars you too can fill your house with that memorable fragrance.
It was always a challenge for me to figure out how to hang the various garments and laundry items on the line. Everyone had an opinion on the proper way to hang a shirt and it seems a shirt hung differently from a blouse. Sheets were my favorite to hang since you simply lay them across two lines and applied the pins, not very difficult. On a good summer day I don’t believe it took any longer for clothes to dry on the line than it does in a modern dryer today. Maybe the memory has distorted my internal clock.
Mom would send us out to gather the clothes soon after they were deemed dry in fear of a frequent Southern summer shower. As I gathered the clothes into the basket I would spread the clothes pins out to have them ready for the next round. It wasn’t fun to try and hold a garment while reaching down the line to find a clothes pin.
Today Mom continues to use her clothes line no different than my early days in Cherokee. I am willing to bet Mom’s clothes dryer doesn’t spin a half dozen times each year. Those of you who seem appalled at exposing your clothing on a line today probably haven’t really experienced the pleasure of sun dried linen.
Back at the conference I glanced around the room to see who would raise their hand in an auditorium full of engineering professionals. Two people raised their hands to the snicker of others in the room. Later that day we discussed the benefits of solar energy and how we can implement cost savings. If only they realized we already discussed one of the best uses of solar energy that began long before we even discovered the oil that fuels most of our vehicles.
