Drying Laundry Quotes

You don’t need fashion designers when you are young. Have faith in your own bad taste. Buy the cheapest thing in your local thrift shop - the clothes that are freshly out of style with even the hippest people a few years older than you. Get on the fashion nerves of your peers, not your parents - that is the key to fashion leadership. Ill-fitting is always stylish. But be more creative - wear your clothes inside out, backward, upside down. Throw bleach in a load of colored laundry. Follow the exact opposite of the dry cleaning instructions inside the clothes that cost the most in your thrift shop. Don’t wear jewelry - stick Band-Aids on your wrists or make a necklace out of them. Wear Scotch tape on the side of your face like a bad face-lift attempt. Mismatch your shoes. Best yet, do as Mink Stole used to do: go to the thrift store the day after Halloween, when the children’s trick-or-treat costumes are on sale, buy one, and wear it as your uniform of defiance.

Do you know about the spoons? Because you should. The Spoon Theory was created by a friend of mine, Christine Miserandino, to explain the limits you have when you live with chronic illness. Most healthy people have a seemingly infinite number of spoons at their disposal, each one representing the energy needed to do a task. You get up in the morning. That’s a spoon. You take a shower. That’s a spoon. You work, and play, and clean, and love, and hate, and that’s lots of damn spoons … but if you are young and healthy you still have spoons left over as you fall asleep and wait for the new supply of spoons to be delivered in the morning. But if you are sick or in pain, your exhaustion changes you and the number of spoons you have. Autoimmune disease or chronic pain like I have with my arthritis cuts down on your spoons. Depression or anxiety takes away even more. Maybe you only have six spoons to use that day. Sometimes you have even fewer. And you look at the things you need to do and realize that you don’t have enough spoons to do them all. If you clean the house you won’t have any spoons left to exercise. You can visit a friend but you won’t have enough spoons to drive yourself back home. You can accomplish everything a normal person does for hours but then you hit a wall and fall into bed thinking, “I wish I could stop breathing for an hour because it’s exhausting, all this inhaling and exhaling.” And then your husband sees you lying on the bed and raises his eyebrow seductively and you say, “No. I can’t have sex with you today because there aren’t enough spoons,” and he looks at you strangely because that sounds kinky, and not in a good way. And you know you should explain the Spoon Theory so he won’t get mad but you don’t have the energy to explain properly because you used your last spoon of the morning picking up his dry cleaning so instead you just defensively yell: “I SPENT ALL MY SPOONS ON YOUR LAUNDRY,” and he says, “What the … You can’t pay for dry cleaning with spoons. What is wrong with you?” Now you’re mad because this is his fault too but you’re too tired to fight out loud and so you have the argument in your mind, but it doesn’t go well because you’re too tired to defend yourself even in your head, and the critical internal voices take over and you’re too tired not to believe them. Then you get more depressed and the next day you wake up with even fewer spoons and so you try to make spoons out of caffeine and willpower but that never really works. The only thing that does work is realizing that your lack of spoons is not your fault, and to remind yourself of that fact over and over as you compare your fucked-up life to everyone else’s just-as-fucked-up-but-not-as-noticeably-to-outsiders lives. Really, the only people you should be comparing yourself to would be people who make you feel better by comparison. For instance, people who are in comas, because those people have no spoons at all and you don’t see anyone judging them. Personally, I always compare myself to Galileo because everyone knows he’s fantastic, but he has no spoons at all because he’s dead. So technically I’m better than Galileo because all I’ve done is take a shower and already I’ve accomplished more than him today. If we were having a competition I’d have beaten him in daily accomplishments every damn day of my life. But I’m not gloating because Galileo can’t control his current spoon supply any more than I can, and if Galileo couldn’t figure out how to keep his dwindling spoon supply I think it’s pretty unfair of me to judge myself for mine. I’ve learned to use my spoons wisely. To say no. To push myself, but not too hard. To try to enjoy the amazingness of life while teetering at the edge of terror and fatigue.

Spiders evidently as surprised by the weather as the rest of us: their webs were still everywhere - little silken laundry lines with perfect snowflakes hung out in rows to dry.

It doesn't matter for crap that you've got three years of sobriety or that you finally look good in a two-piece bathing suit or you've met that perfect someone and you've fallen deeply, wildly, passionately in love. Today, as you pick up your dry cleaning, fax those reports, fold your laundry, or wash the dinner dishes, something you'd never expect is already stalking you.

He has to wair for another load of laundry to get done. So I wait with him. I lean back against the couch, sitting really low the way I like. I scrunch over and put my head on his shoulder. We sit like that for a long time. Watching other people's laundry dry. <3

Air in the chateau clammy like laundry that won't dry. Door-banging drafts down the passageways. Autumn is leaving its mellowness behind for its spiky, rotted stage. Don't remember summer even saying good-bye.

Summer rain smelled like newly clipped grass, like mouths stained red with berry juice - blueberries, raspberries, blackberries. It smelled like late nights spent pointing constellations out from their starry guises, freshly washed laundry drying outside on the line, like barbecues and stolen kisses in a 1932 Ford Coupe

I try not to notice the exploded eyeballs or the ruptured tongue bursting through the blackened lips. This job is quite gross enough as it is without adding my own dry heaves to the mess.

My mom always said, there are two kinds of love in this world: the steady breeze, and the hurricane. The steady breeze is slow and patient. It fills the sails of the boats in the harbor, and lifts laundry on the line. It cools you on a hot summer’s day; brings the leaves of fall, like clockwork every year. You can count on a breeze, steady and sure and true. But there’s nothing steady about a hurricane. It rips through town, reckless, sending the ocean foaming up the shore, felling trees and power lines and anyone dumb or fucked-up enough to stand in its path. Sure, it’s a thrill like nothing you’ve ever known: your pulse kicks, your body calls to it, like a spirit possessed. It’s wild and breathless and all-consuming. But what comes next? “You see a hurricane coming, you run.” My mom told me, the summer I turned eighteen. “You shut the doors, and you bar the windows. Because come morning, there’ll be nothing but the wreckage left behind.” Emerson Ray was my hurricane. Looking back, I wonder if mom saw it in my eyes: the storm clouds gathering, the dry crackle of electricity in the air. But it was already too late. No warning sirens were going to save me. I guess you never really know the danger, not until you’re the one left, huddled on the ground, surrounded by the pieces of your broken heart. It’s been four years now since that summer. Since Emerson. It took everything I had to pull myself back together, to crawl out of the empty wreckage of my life and build something new in its place. This time, I made it storm-proof. Strong. I barred shutters over my heart, and found myself a steady breeze to love. I swore, nothing would ever destroy me like that summer again. I was wrong. That’s the thing about hurricanes. Once the storm touches down, all you can do is pray.

I told him about the macaroni hanging out on the line like laundry to dry on Sunday in Catania. Sometimes he’d invite me to eat with him and we’d talk a little Italian.

Until now (1960, date of the first edition), the history of Black Africa has always been written with dates as dry as laundry lists, and no one has almost ever tried to find the key that unlocks the door to the intelligence, the understanding of African society.

But it’s not just my eyes that suffer at dawn, it’s my heart that breaks. I feel the light that blazes across the city, striking my face but also warming my marrow, and as it rises I continue to look at my neighbors’ laundry, threadbare and bone-dry. Then I close my eyes so that I see the light through my eyelids, and I regret being typically sluggish and missing out on this extraordinary, everyday phenomenon

Elsa thought of all the laundry she’d done in her life, the joy she’d always taken in hanging sheets to dry, but never until now had she fully, deeply appreciated the sheer physical pleasure of clean sheets on naked skin. The fresh smell of lavender soap in her hair.

What I did realize was that once you've loved and lost, your heart is left tattered and frayed as the insides of a worn old sneaker. And no amount of laundry in the world can ever make the sneaker look brand new again. All you can do is lay it out under the sun or store it in a cool, dry place.

THOSE BORN UNDER Pacific Northwest skies are like daffodils: they can achieve beauty only after a long, cold sulk in the rain. Henry, our mother, and I were Pacific Northwest babies. At the first patter of raindrops on the roof, a comfortable melancholy settled over the house. The three of us spent dark, wet days wrapped in old quilts, sitting and sighing at the watery sky. Viviane, with her acute gift for smell, could close her eyes and know the season just by the smell of the rain. Summer rain smelled like newly clipped grass, like mouths stained red with berry juice — blueberries, raspberries, blackberries. It smelled like late nights spent pointing constellations out from their starry guises, freshly washed laundry drying outside on the line, like barbecues and stolen kisses in a 1932 Ford Coupe. The first of the many autumn rains smelled smoky, like a doused campsite fire, as if the ground itself had been aflame during those hot summer months. It smelled like burnt piles of collected leaves, the cough of a newly revived chimney, roasted chestnuts, the scent of a man’s hands after hours spent in a woodshop. Fall rain was not Viviane’s favorite. Rain in the winter smelled simply like ice, the cold air burning the tips of ears, cheeks, and eyelashes. Winter rain was for hiding in quilts and blankets, for tying woolen scarves around noses and mouths — the moisture of rasping breaths stinging chapped lips. The first bout of warm spring rain caused normally respectable women to pull off their stockings and run through muddy puddles alongside their children. Viviane was convinced it was due to the way the rain smelled: like the earth, tulip bulbs, and dahlia roots. It smelled like the mud along a riverbed, like if she opened her mouth wide enough, she could taste the minerals in the air. Viviane could feel the heat of the rain against her fingers when she pressed her hand to the ground after a storm. But in 1959, the year Henry and I turned fifteen, those warm spring rains never arrived. March came and went without a single drop falling from the sky. The air that month smelled dry and flat. Viviane would wake up in the morning unsure of where she was or what she should be doing. Did the wash need to be hung on the line? Was there firewood to be brought in from the woodshed and stacked on the back porch? Even nature seemed confused. When the rains didn’t appear, the daffodil bulbs dried to dust in their beds of mulch and soil. The trees remained leafless, and the squirrels, without acorns to feed on and with nests to build, ran in confused circles below the bare limbs. The only person who seemed unfazed by the disappearance of the rain was my grandmother. Emilienne was not a Pacific Northwest baby nor a daffodil. Emilienne was more like a petunia. She needed the water but could do without the puddles and wet feet. She didn’t have any desire to ponder the gray skies. She found all the rain to be a bit of an inconvenience, to be honest.

It was June in Maharashtra, and the monsoon would not come. The whole district lay panting in the heat, the burning sky clapped tight overhead like the lid of a tandoor oven. Lean goats stumbled down the narrow alleyways, udders hanging slack and dry beneath them; beggars cried for water in every village. Dust-devils swept over baked clay and through the dry weeds, whistling and shrieking. Hot sand blew into the eyes of torpid bullocks as they leaned into the yoke, whips snapping over their bony backs. A single stream crept along the valley floor, shrunken and muddy, and women stood ankle deep in its shallows, beating their laundry against rocks that rippled and danced in the sun.

When I’m finished, I have a sense of accomplishment. A sense of competence. I am good at doing the laundry. At least that. And it’s a religious experience, you know. Water, earth, fire—polarities of wet and dry, hot and cold, dirty and clean. The great cycles—round and round—beginning and end—Alpha and Omega, amen. I am in touch with the GREAT SOMETHING-OR-OTHER. For a moment, at least, life is tidy and has meaning.

Old man,” she said. “Don’t you want to prepare or something?” “Prepare what?” “Yourself. For death.” Siri laughed. “Well, Bpoo. Let’s see. If the Buddhists are right, I’m just on my way to the next incarnation. Unless there’s a manual for how to behave correctly as a gnat I’m not sure how I’d prepare for that. If the Catholics are right, nothing short of an asbestos suit and a glass of iced water will help where I’m going. And if the communists are right, you do your best and when you’re gone they put up a statue in your honor and the locals dry their laundry on it. So, if I’m going, you’re the heir to today’s legacy.

She sorted through the clothes. “Do you mind wearing Emilio’s underwear?” She turned back to him with the two different styles that she’d found. “You’re about the same size. And they’re clean. They were wrapped in a paper package, like from a laundry service.” Max gave her a look, because along with the very nice, very expensive pair of black silk boxers she’d pilfered from Emilio, she’d also borrowed one of his thongs. “What?” Gina said. It was definitely a man-thong. It had all that extra room for various non-female body parts. “Don’t be ridiculous.” “I’m not,” she said, trying to play it as serious. “One, it’s been a while, maybe your tastes have changed. And two, these might actually be more comfortable, considering the placement of your bandage and—” He took the boxers from her. “Apparently I was wrong.” She turned away and started sorting through the pairs of pants and Bermuda shorts she’d grabbed, trying not to be too obvious about the fact that she was watching him out of the corner of her eye. To make sure he didn’t fall over. Right. After he got the boxers on, he took off the bathrobe and . . . Okay, he definitely wasn’t as skinny as he’d been after his lengthy stint in the hospital. Emilio’s pants probably weren’t going to fit him, after all. Although, there was one pair that looked like they’d be nice and loose . . . There they were. The Kelly green Bermuda shorts. Max gave her another one of those you’ve-got-to-be-kidding glances as he put the bathrobe over the back of another chair. “Do I really look as if I’ve ever worn shorts that color in my entire life?” She tried not to smile. “I honestly don’t think you have much choice.” She let herself look at him. “You know, you could just go with the boxers. At least until your pants dry. You know what would really work with that, though? A bowtie.” She turned, as if to go back to the closet. “I’m sure Emilio has a tux. Judging from his other clothes, it’s probably polyester and chartreuse, but maybe the bowtie is—” “Gina.” Max stopped her before she reached the door. He motioned for her to come back. She held out the green shorts, but instead of taking them, he took her arm, pulled her close. “I love you,” Max said, as if he were dispatching some terrible, dire news that somehow still managed to amuse him at least a little. Gina had been hoping that he’d say it, praying even, but the fact that he’d managed to smile, even just a bit while he did, was a miracle. And then, before her heart even had a chance to start beating again, he kissed her. And oh, she was also beyond ready for that particular marvel, for the sweet softness of his mouth, for the solidness of his arms around her. There was more of him to hold her since he’d regained his fighting weight—and that was amazing, too. She skimmed her hands across the muscular smoothness of his back, his shoulders, as his kiss changed from tender to heated. And, God. That was a miracle, too. Except she couldn’t help but wonder about those words, wrenched from him, as if it cost him his soul to speak them aloud. Why tell her this right now? Yes, she’d been waiting for years for him to say that he loved her, but . . . Max laughed his surprise. “No. Why do you . . .?” He figured it out himself. “No, no, Gina, just . . . I should’ve said it before. I should have said it years ago, but I really should have said it, you know, instead of hi.” He laughed again, clearly disgusted with himself. “God, I’m an idiot. I mean, hi? I should have walked in and said, ‘Gina, I need you. I love you, don’t ever leave me again.’” She stared at him. It was probably a good thing that he hadn’t said that at the time, because she might’ve fainted. It was obvious that he wanted her to say something, but she was completely speechless.

The Kid in the Plain Brown Wrapper If Jennifer Murdley hadn’t been forced to wear her brother’s underpants to school, the whole thing might never have happened. But when she walked into the laundry room on the morning of October 13th, she found her father pouring liquid detergent onto a load of clothes that included every pair of underwear she owned. “Dad!” she screamed. “Wait!” She was too late. The tub was filling, her underwear was soggy and soapy, and there was no chance of getting any of it dry before she had to leave for school. “Don’t worry,” said Mr. Murdley, holding up a stack of neatly folded underpants, “you can wear a pair of these!” “You have got to be kidding! Those belong to Skippy!” The conversation that followed wasn’t pretty. The bottom line had been that Jennifer was going to school, and she was going to wear underwear, even if it did belong to her brother.

In the courtyard, jasmine sugared the air, great white sprays tumbling from the top of a wooden arbor at the side of the lawn. Huge goldfish swam slowly near the surface of the pool, listing their plump bodies backwards and forwards to court the afternoon sun. It was heavenly, but I didn't stick around; a distant band of trees was calling to me and I wove my way towards it, through the meadow dusted with buttercups, self-sown amid the long grass. Although it wasn't quite summer, the day was warm, the air dry, and by the time I reached the trees my hairline was laced with perspiration. I spread the rug in a patch of dappled light and kicked off my shoes. Somewhere nearby a shallow brook chattered over stones and butterflies sailed the breeze. The blanket smelled reassuringly of laundry flakes and squashed leaves, and when I sat down the tall meadow grasses enclosed me so I felt utterly alone.

SHE HAD WATCHED THEM in supermarkets and she knew the signs. At seven o'clock on a Saturday evening they would be standing in the checkout line reading the horoscope in Harper's Bazaar and in their carts would be a single lamb chop and maybe two cans of cat food and the Sunday morning paper, the early edition with the comics wrapped outside. They would be very pretty some of the time, their skirts the right length and their sunglasses the right tint and maybe only a little vulnerable tightness around the mouth, but there they were, one lamb chop and some cat food and the morning paper. To avoid giving off the signs, Maria shopped always for a household, gallons of grapefruit juice, quarts of green chile salsa, dried lentils and alphabet noodles, rigatoni and canned yams, twenty-pound boxes of laundry detergent. She knew all the indices to the idle lonely, never bought a small tube of toothpaste, never dropped a magazine in her shopping cart. The house in Beverly Hills overflowed with sugar, corn-muffin mix, frozen roasts and Spanish onions. Maria ate cottage cheese.

Thus, no matter where you live in New York City, you will find within a block or two a grocery store, a barbershop, a newsstand and shoeshine shack, an ice-coal-and-wood cellar (where you write your order on a pad outside as you walk by), a dry cleaner, a laundry, a delicatessen (beer and sandwiches delivered at any hour to your door), a flower shop, an undertaker's parlor, a movie house, a radio-repair shop, a stationer, a haberdasher, a tailor, a drug-store, a garage, a tearoom, a saloon, a hardware store, a liquor store, a shoe-repair shop. Every block or two, in most residential sections of New York, is a little main street. A man starts for work in the morning and before he has gone two hundred yards he has completed half a dozen missions: bought a paper, left a pair of shoes to be soled, picked up a pack of cigarettes, ordered a bottle of whiskey to be dispatched in the opposite direction against his home-coming, written a message to the unseen forces of the wood cellar, and notified the dry cleaner that a pair of trousers awaits call. Homeward bound eight hours later, he buys a bunch of pussy willows, a Mazda bulb, a drink, a shine-- all between the corner where he steps off the bus and his apartment.

If you aren't in love, Willow Vaughn, then my name isn't Miriam Brigham." Willow started out of her daydreaming and glanced up from the laundry tub. Miriam stood before her with her fists planted on her hips. "Now, Miriam, I-" "No sense denying it, young lady. You've got that dreamy dazed glow about you. Rider Sinclair isn't much better, the way he hangs around you,like a bee drawn to honey. He's always holding your hand or throwing his arm around you when he thinks I'm not looking." "Well,even if I were in love, it wouldn't change anything. I still don't want another man to look after, and I don't need one looking out for me either. I can take care of myself!" "Course, you can!" Miriam agreed, picking the last sheet out of the rinse water and wringing it out. "Most women can. Look at me, I run a boarding house and support myself just fine. But let me tell you something. That lonely bed of mine is mighty cold on winter nights, even here in the territory." Willow blushed and concentrated on her hands where they rested on the edge of the tub. "Willow," Miriam continued, "you've been managing your pa just fine since he got home. A husband isn't any more difficult to manage than a father, unless, of course, you're married to a no-good lout." Willow dried her hands on the wide white apron around her middle. "But, Miriam, if I don't marry, then I don't have to bother finagling a man to my way of doing things. Staying single makes a hell of a lot more sense!" "Watch the cursing, young lady." Miriam slung the sheet over the line and returned to help Willow with the wash tub. They each grapped a handle and carried it a few feet before setting it down to rest their arms a moment. "Willow, use your noggin, will you? Part of the fun of being a woman is wrapping some big, handsome hunk of a man around your little finger. You do have to use your good sense, though, and realize when you're wrong and he's right. Of course"-Miriam chuckled-"that won't be too often. "And you have to be careful not to hurt a man's feelings overly much. Men are funny creatures. They seldom let their emotions show because they think it isn't manly. But you can tell when they're upset.They start pouting like a little boy.I've always thought that was rather curious.

Some of these bots are already arriving in 2021 in more primitive forms. Recently, when I was in quarantine at home in Beijing, all of my e-commerce packages and food were delivered by a robot in my apartment complex. The package would be placed on a sturdy, wheeled creature resembling R2-D2. It could wirelessly summon the elevator, navigate autonomously to my door, and then call my phone to announce its arrival, so I could take the package, after which it would return to reception. Fully autonomous door-to-door delivery vans are also being tested in Silicon Valley. By 2041, end-to-end delivery should be pervasive, with autonomous forklifts moving items in the warehouse, drones and autonomous vehicles delivering the boxes to the apartment complex, and the R2-D2 bot delivering the package to each home. Similarly, some restaurants now use robotic waiters to reduce human contact. These are not humanoid robots, but autonomous trays-on-wheels that deliver your order to your table. Robot servers today are both gimmicks and safety measures, but tomorrow they may be a normal part of table service for many restaurants, apart from the highest-end establishments or places that cater to tourists, where the human service is integral to the restaurant’s charm. Robots can be used in hotels (to clean and to deliver laundry, suitcases, and room service), offices (as receptionists, guards, and cleaning staff), stores (to clean floors and organize shelves), and information outlets (to answer questions and give directions at airports, hotels, and offices). In-home robots will go beyond the Roomba. Robots can wash dishes (not like a dishwasher, but as an autonomous machine in which you can pile all the greasy pots, utensils, and plates without removing leftover food, with all of them emerging cleaned, disinfected, dried, and organized). Robots can cook—not like a humanoid chef, but like an automated food processor connected to a self-cooking pot. Ingredients go in and the cooked dish comes out. All of these technology components exist now—and will be fine-tuned and integrated in the decade to come. So be patient. Wait for robotics to be perfected and for costs to go down. The commercial and subsequently personal applications will follow. By 2041, it’s not far-fetched to say that you may be living a lot more like the Jetsons!

My little undomesticated pornstar pushed me so hard between her legs, my oxygen levels plummeted. She clenched around my fingers through her panties as an orgasm rolled through her in waves. The gush of warmth soaked the cotton. I kissed her through the fabric, again and again, knowing tomorrow everything would return to its proper position—my boundaries, my limits, my hang-ups, my demons. “Can I return the favor?” Dallas sat half up. “But not through your briefs. Men’s briefs always smell like old cheese that’s been sitting in a crockpot for days. I know because whenever my housekeeper went on vacation, we all took turns doing the laundry. And, well, I really shouldn’t say, but Dadd—” Not wanting the moment to be ruined with a conversation about her father’s underwear, I pulled forward, shutting her smart mouth with a kiss that tasted like her sweet pussy. At first, she pinched her lips and made a face, unsure what she thought about her own taste. But when I dragged the tip of my hard cock along her slit through our clothes, she went wild and kissed me back, shoving her tongue so deep down my throat I thought she would fish out my dinner. “Yes.” She wiggled against me. “Please, sir, may I have some more?” She’d quoted Oliver Twist while getting fucked. Truly, the woman was one of a kind. Knowing it was idiotic, and dangerous, and deranged, I pushed my tip through her slit. She was tight—tighter, still, through the tattered, stretched cotton of her ruined panties—but wet and sleek, ready for what was coming. The sensation, how warm and taut she felt, completely undid me. I thrust harder and deeper, entering her through our underwear, fucking her slowly with only flimsy fabric between us. I tore my mouth from hers, eyes glued to my cock each time it sank into her. I could barely fit inside, she was so tight. This was, by far, the best fuck I’d ever had. She panted. “Is this what people call dry-humping?” No. Nothing about this was dry. I was basically fucking her through our underwear. Only, explaining to her that this was full-blown sex with a side order of my issues was not in my plans for tonight. Or ever. “Sure.” Each push brought me closer to a climax. From slow, controlled, teasing thrusts designed to drive her mad with desire, I quickly derailed to jerky, manic, need-to-be-inside-this-woman plunges. Of a man so hungry for human connection, for affection, for carnal needs to be met and satisfied. My head grew dizzy. I’d taken into consideration the possibility that Dallas couldn’t come through penetration. It merely placed her in the same majority as most females on Planet Earth. But she shook, clawed, and reached for me, looking ready to climax. Her tits bounced and jiggled each time I slammed into her. Her mouth opened in awe, probably because this orgasm felt different from the first two. Deeper and more violent. She clutched the lapels of my shirt, shoving her face in mine. “Lose the underwear.” She met my thrust, groaning when my crown peeked past the slot in my boxer briefs. “I want you to come inside me. I want to feel you.” I was about two seconds from fulfilling her demand. Luckily, my logic grabbed the steering wheel, which my cock had seized sometime this evening, and derailed the situation from full-blown calamity. I managed to wait until she came, just barely, before pulling out, flipping her onto her stomach, and jerking off. I aimed for her bare ass but somehow came on her hair. No matter. She had plenty of time to wash it. Her agenda wasn’t exactly full. Dallas fell back onto the pillows, a lopsided grin on her face. (Chapter 31)

Just be careful of the what-ifs,” she warns. They’ll tumble in your head like laundry that won’t dry.

Since we’re on the topic of stains, here’s the absolute best thing you’re going to learn from me: with the exception of mud and ink, almost every single stain will benefit from being flushed with cold water. Hold the stained area taut under a running faucet and let the water pressure do a lot of the work for you. If you have a sponge or towel nearby, that’s even better: use it to help push the stain out even more while under the running water. A small amount of soap—dish soap, hand soap, laundry detergent, whatever is close by—will also really help matters. If the stained garment is dry-clean-only and you don’t want to risk making things worse, you should point out the stain when you drop the item off with your cleaner so they can spot treat it.

You know it's time to do the laundry when you dry off with a sneaker,

The wind swoops over the tenements on Orchard Street, where some of those starry-eyed dreams have died and yet other dreams are being born into squalor and poverty, an uphill climb. It gives a slap to the laundry stretched on lines between tenements, over dirty, broken streets where, even at this hour, hungry children scour the bins for food. The wind has existed forever. It has seen much in this country of dreams and soap ads, old horrors and bloodshed. It has played mute witness to its burning witches, and has walked along a Trail of Tears; it has seen the slave ships release their human cargo, blinking and afraid, into the ports, their only possession a grief they can never lose. The wind was there when President Lincoln fell to an assassin’s bullet. It smelled of gunpowder at Antietam. It ran with the buffalo and touched tentative fingers to the tall black hats of Puritans. It has carried shouts of love, and it has dried tears to salt tracks on more faces than it can number. The

There’s this smell that only exists in Milwaukee in October. The thin smoky jet of laundry after the rain. Wet leaves half-drying, half getting wet again. Open PBR cans, cigarettes, leather. A mix of youth and nostalgia, of losing something as you’re living it. The feeling, both terrifying and comforting, that life would always be exactly like this.

and raised their eyebrows as if they were doing their best to make sense of everything I said. I picked up my instruction sheet and started to work my way through the house. First, I checked in the laundry room and made sure the cats’ food and water dishes were full. Ling-Ling ran to me as soon as she heard the dry food spilling into her bowl, and right behind her came an orange-y cat. “Crosby!” I said out loud. “How are ya?” He hardly glanced at me; he was headed straight for the food. By the time I had finished filling up the water bowls, all five cats were chomping away. I decided that I’d wait to feed the dogs until after I’d walked them, so my next stop was the hamsters and guinea pigs. Their cages were in the kitchen, and when I walked in, the first thing I heard was a funny whistling noise. “What is that?” I asked Cheryl, who was following along behind me. Of course she didn’t answer. I shrugged. “Oh, well,” I said. I checked the instruction sheet to see how much food to put out, and next to the guinea-pig notes I saw this: “Don’t worry about that whistling noise. It’s normal. Ricky does it more often than Lucy.” Well, that explained that. I put out food for the hamsters and for Lucy

Holy is the dish and drain The soap and sink, and the cup and plate And the warm wool socks, and cold white tile Showerheads and good dry towels And frying eggs sound like psalms With a bit of salt measured in my palm It’s all a part of a sacrament As holy as a day is spent Holy is the busy street And cars that boom with passion’s beat And the check out girl, counting change And the hands that shook my hands today And hymns of geese fly overhead And stretch their wings like their parents did Blessed be the dog, that runs in her sleep To catch that wild and elusive thing Holy is the familiar room And the quiet moments in the afternoon And folding sheets like folding hands To pray as only laundry can I’m letting go of all I fear Like autumn leaves of earth and air For summer came and summer went As holy as a day is spent Holy is the place I stand To give whatever small good I can And the empty page, and the open book Redemption everywhere I look Unknowingly we slow our pace In the shade of unexpected grace And with grateful smiles and sad lament As holy as a day is spent And morning light sings “Providence” As holy as a day is spent

My clothes aren’t going to get dried until you wash them. Which involves putting them in the washer, and that involves picking them off the floor.” Marshell wiggled his eyebrows at me, then turned and stepped into the shower. I did drool when I got a look at his ass. “Oh my….” Did I mention I was an ass man? “Remi?” “Uh-huh?” My vocabulary had taken a hike, it appeared. “I can smell your desire. If you’re still here by the count of five, I’m getting out and coming after you. One of us is going to get fucked in this awesome shower of yours, so….” Marshell said from the shower. “One.” The sound I made was a cross between a squeak and a growl, thanks to acres and acres of wet, glistening skin. I wanted to run my tongue over every square— “Two…. “Three….” I grabbed his jeans and ran. The softly whispered word “chicken” followed me out of there. I was halfway to the laundry room before I could take a deep breath. Then it hit me what I’d done. I ran out on him. Honestly calling me a chicken was too kind. I was a coward. The only reason I ran was because I was afraid to bottom. I was a top. I always topped. I threw his clothes in the washer, tossed in one of those little pods, and turned it on. Then banged my head against it. What was I doing? Why was I standing here and not in the shower with him? Yes, I topped because I was afraid to do anything else. My one and only experience with bottoming was an unmitigated disaster. A painful, excruciating, unbearable disaster, and I hadn’t repeated the experience since. “I’m an idiot.” What happened was a long time ago. A really, really long time ago, and I let it shape me. Not only shape me, but run my life. I knew that, but it didn’t really seem to matter. The males I hooked up with were bottoms. They wanted me to top, so it was never an issue. Now things had changed. Marshell was my mate. I knew perfectly well he’d take care not to hurt me. How did I know? Because when I got a chance at that ass of his—and I certainly planned to—I’d take care not to hurt him either. All I had to do was… trust him. Trust him. But I really didn’t know him. Then again, I nearly lost him too. My goddess wouldn’t match me with someone I couldn’t love. Maybe I needed to trust her. Maybe… maybe I needed to trust myself. Something deep inside me said Marshell was a good man. I hurried out of the laundry and back to the bathroom.

Chapter Twenty-Eight The Crash ADDISON HAD SAT ON couches that were longer than Dax’s plane. The four-seat Cessna Skyhawk was a cramped ride even when you didn’t have a 150-pound Great Dane named Mr. Jacobsen on your lap. The wings were mounted awkwardly on top of the plane, instead of sprouting from the sides. Addison wasn’t sure if the plane was designed for flying or drying laundry. All in all, the Skyhawk had all the stylish sophistication of a garbage disposal, except with less pickup. Still, after the harrowing taxi ride to Ataturk Airport, Addison thought Dax’s airplane felt downright safe by comparison. Istanbul was already a pinprick in the distance when the plane reached cruising altitude,

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William waved his hand, telling her, “Your turn. Let’s hear a sexual fantasy.” She thought for a moment. Eyes going dreamy, setting off all kinds of warning bells inside his head, she said, “I picture a strong, gorgeous man. He’s dressed, but not for long. He strips. I watch.” William’s mouth went dry. The warning bells? Forgotten. “And then?” She purred with pure, sexual carnality, nearly unmanning him. “He strips me, too, and...does a load of laundry, washing our dirty clothes. Oh, yeah. Oh, baby.

moment.’ She smiled. ‘How old are you, Ned?’ ‘Nineteen.’ ‘You risked your life for me.’ She stood on tiptoe and kissed him on the lips briefly but tenderly. ‘Thank you,’ she said. Then she left the room. * MOST PEOPLE BATHED twice a year, in spring and autumn, but princesses were fastidious, and Elizabeth bathed more often. It was a major operation, with maidservants carrying big two-handled laundry tubs of hot water from the kitchen fire to her bedchamber, hurrying up the stairs before the water cooled. She took a bath the day after Swithin’s visit, as if to wash away her disgust. She had said no more about Swithin, after kissing Ned, but Ned thought he had won her trust. Ned knew he had made an enemy of a powerful earl, but he hoped it would not last: Swithin was quick-tempered and vengeful but, Ned thought, he had a short attention span. With luck he would nurse his grudge against Ned only until a better one came along. Sir William Cecil had arrived shortly after Swithin left, and next morning he got down to work with Ned. Cecil’s office was in the same wing as Elizabeth’s private suite. He sent Ned to Tom Parry’s office to fetch a ledger of expenditure for another house Elizabeth owned. Coming back with the heavy book in his hand, Ned walked along Elizabeth’s corridor, where the floorboards were puddled with water spilled by the maids. As he passed her suite, he saw that the door was open, and – stupidly – he glanced in. Elizabeth had just got out of her bath. The tub itself was screened off, but she had stepped across the room to pick up a large white linen sheet with which to dry herself. There should have been a maid waiting beside the tub holding

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When you wash your clothes, they have to pass through the washer and the dryer in sequence, and different loads will take different amounts of time in each. A heavily soiled load might take longer to wash but the usual time to dry; a large load might take longer to dry but the usual time to wash. So, Johnson asked, if you have several loads of laundry to do on the same day, what’s the best way to do them? His answer was that you should begin by finding the single step that takes the least amount of time—the load that will wash or dry the quickest. If that shortest step involves the washer, plan to do that load first. If it involves the dryer, plan to do it last. Repeat this process for the remaining loads, working from the two ends of the schedule toward the middle.

Well, I would leave the laundry out; it added a certain atmosphere of neglect, as did the lily pad pond overtaken by ivy, the roses choked with weeds. A few hydrangea blossoms hung brown and dry on the shrubs, rattling sadly in the breeze. It was well hidden, the splendor of what had been, and that was fine with me. I could still remember Gran's garden out back the way it used to be- goldfish in the pond; hydrangea blooms heavy and blue, the color of the sky; sunflowers bent down upon themselves.

lived with my extended family—there were twenty of us—in a big house with a central courtyard we used for meetings and household tasks, like preparing food or hanging up laundry to dry. Parents, grandparents, cousins, aunts, and uncles, we shared a strong bond. In my land, family is sacred, and elders are the most important

Fullers were the Roman equivalents of laundry and dry-cleaning firms: soap had not been invented and clothes were bleached with human and animal urine

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Do not put off laundry for another day. Even if it is just a small amount, be sure to do a wash every day and dry it immediately. If

Neurodivergent Checklist Time Blindness: Many neurodivergent people have trouble properly perceiving time as it passes. It either goes by too quickly or slowly. The perception of time depends on the level of stimulation the neurodivergent person is dealing with. It also can vary depending on what you’re focused on. If you’ve ever found yourself unable to account for time, you may be neurodivergent. Executive Dysfunction: This is what you experience when you want to accomplish a task, but despite how hard you try, you cannot see it through. Executive dysfunction happens for various reasons, depending on the type of neurodivergence in question. Still, the point is that this is a common occurrence in neurodivergent people. Task Multiplication: What is task multiplication? It happens when you set off to accomplish one thing but have to do a million other things, even though that wasn’t your original plan. For instance, you may want to sit down to finish some writing, only to notice water on the floor. You get up to grab a mop, and on the way, you notice the laundry you were supposed to drop off at the dry cleaners. Stooping to pick up the bag, you find yourself at eye level with your journal and remember you were supposed to make an entry the previous day, so you’re going to do that now. On and on it goes. Inconsistent Sleep Habits: This depends on what sort of neurodivergence you’re dealing with and if you’ve got comorbid disorders. Most importantly, neurodivergent people sleep more or less than “regular” people. You may also notice that your sleep habits fluctuate a lot. Sometimes you may sleep for eight hours at a stretch for a week, only to suddenly start running on just three hours of sleep. Emotional Dysregulation: With many neurodivergent people, it’s hard to keep emotions in check. Emotional dysregulation occurs in extreme emotions, sudden mood swings, or inappropriate emotional reactions (either not responding to the degree they should or overreacting). Hyperfixation: This also plays out differently depending on the brand of neurodivergence in question. Often, neurodivergent people get very involved in topics or hobbies to the point of what others may think of as obsession. Picking Up on Subtleties but Missing the Obvious: Neurodivergent people may struggle with picking up on things neurotypical people can see easily. At the same time, they are incredibly adept at noticing the subtle things everyone else misses. Sensory Sensitivities: If you’re neurodivergent, you may be unable to ignore your clothes tag scratching your back, have trouble hearing certain sounds, and can’t quite deal with certain textures of clothing, food, and so on. Rejection Sensitivity: Neurodivergent people are often more sensitive to rejection than others due to neurological differences and life experiences. For instance, children with ADHD get much more negative feedback than their peers without ADHD. Neurodivergent people are often rejected to the point where they notice rejection even when it’s not there.

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The scattered bloodstains across the front of the dress were light as freckles, but the darker stains on the back, a half dozen stains as long as six or seven inches, had turned a sour yellowish shade, unmistakable. Like the stained crotches of certain of her panties which Marianne scrubbed, scrubbed by hand to rid them of traces of menstrual blood before drying them in her closet and dropping them into the laundry chute.

Here Are the Perks of Being President: • You don’t ever have to make your own bed. • You don’t ever have to cook your own breakfast (although that was something Gerald Ford liked to do anyway). • You don’t ever have to do your own laundry or take your own clothes to the dry cleaner (but you do have to pay for the dry cleaning yourself; you will be billed for it at the beginning of each month). But Wait! There’s More!! The following free perks also come with the job: • Ballpoint pens • Personalized stationary • High-speed Internet access • Toothbrush cups emblazoned with the presidential seal Nightly turn-down service Breath mints

From the airport, we caught a taxi to the apartment building on South Beretania Street where Barack had lived with his grandparents during his teenage years while his mother was mostly away, doing anthropological fieldwork in Indonesia. I remember on that car ride being struck by how surprisingly big and urban Honolulu seemed to be, a city stacked next to a body of water not unlike Chicago was. There was a freeway, traffic, and skyscrapers, none of which I remembered seeing during the Brady Bunch’s visit, nor had they factored into my daydreams. My mind clicked furiously, taking everything in, processing it like data. I was twenty-five years old and seeing this place for the first time, alongside this guy whom I felt I knew and yet didn’t fully know, trying to make sense of what all of this was. We passed a series of tightly packed high-rise apartment complexes, where you could see terraces cluttered with bikes and potted plants, people’s laundry strung up and drying in the sun. I remember thinking, Oh, right, this is real life.

If I were clean laundry hanging on the line, by now I’d be close to dry, smelling faintly of rain and fresh thyme, with maybe a touch of smoke.

The ever-extended list of bans – before long it was forbidden for Jews to walk on the pavement on the side of the road next to the park, to go into a laundry or dry cleaner’s, or to make a call from a public telephone – all of this, I still hear Vĕra telling me, said Austerlitz, soon brought Agáta to the brink of despair. I can see her now pacing up and down this room, said Vĕra, I can see her striking her forehead with the flat of her hand, and crying out, chanting the syllables one by one: I do not un der stand it! I do not un der stand it! I shall ne ver un der stand it!!

train, it wasn't surprising on how many of Jiro's moves mirrored Hanzo's. "He should be calling me right about…" Jiro heard the shower being turned off from upstairs and he knew Hanzo more than likely had forgotten to bring in a towel. Jiro never understood why humans couldn't just shake themselves dry as he and other animals did. "Jiro! Come here, boy!" Hanzo's voice resonated throughout the house. Jiro didn't waste any time running upstairs to Hanzo. He already knew what the man wanted, so Jiro made his way over to the laundry basket filled with clean laundry, and grabbed a towel out. "Good boy!" Jiro barked and made his way back downstairs. Hanzo would be another twenty minutes or so, so Jiro was going to practice some of the moves that he had seen Hanzo do.

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This project may be preceeded or followed by the clothing organization steps found in the next section of this book. ORGANIZE CLOTHING examples of storage bedroom closet (walk-in or standard) dresser armoire underbed storage boxes trunk or storage ottoman nightstand supplies needed trash bags/recycling bin, donation box, relocation box, fix-it box spray cleaner and cleaning cloth broom and dust pan and/or vacuum storage containers label maker and/or tags to hang from containers/baskets time commitment 4–10 hours quick assessment questions What are the main categories of clothing? What items could be placed in off-season storage? What types of things need quick and instant access? potential goals for this space make getting ready in the morning a snap make it easier to put away clothing in the evening and on laundry day get rid of clothing that no longer fits create a new wardrobe make the closet visually appealing quick-toss list any clothing that is stained or ripped shoes that are past their prime clothing left over from the high school years (unless, of course, you’re still in high school) souvenir t-shirts broken jewelry socks without mates underwear that has lost its elasticity dry-cleaner hangers and plastic bags storage containers bins/boxes/baskets that are open-top bins/boxes/baskets with lids

potential goals for this space make getting ready in the morning a snap make it easier to put away clothing in the evening and on laundry day get rid of clothing that no longer fits create a new wardrobe make the closet visually appealing quick-toss list any clothing that is stained or ripped shoes that are past their prime clothing left over from the high school years (unless, of course, you’re still in high school) souvenir t-shirts broken jewelry socks without mates underwear that has lost its elasticity dry-cleaner hangers and plastic bags storage containers bins/boxes/baskets that are open-top bins/boxes/baskets with lids double

I cross a bridge at the outskirts of town and look back over the river at rows of houses, windows, lines of drying laundry. It helps to have a set direction to move toward when your mind doesn’t want to think. The

Bruno returns, still clad in only his green towel, hair poofing out a little as it dries. “Everything all right?” I ask, with a stupid smile. I fight my line of sight to stay above the shoulders, but despite my best efforts, my eyes dart down a few times as he strides across the room to his closet. “Yes, clothes. Please,” I say too fast. “Good idea.” Shut. Up. The corner of his mouth hitches up, and his head turns toward my open suitcase on the floor. He bends over and I realize I’m still watching, both to see what he’s doing, and to see if his towel can hang on for the ride. He pulls out a few of my shirts and flings them onto the bed, digging deeper into my suitcase until he pulls out a coral-colored sundress. “Oh, that’s going to look fabulous on you,” I say. “I do not doubt it.” He laughs, turning and holding the dress up to himself, one hip jutting out, then closes the distance between us in a couple of steps. I take the dress from him and do my best to avoid eye contact. But now I’m looking at his chest. His bare chest. His tan, bare chest. And he smells clean, like almonds and oats. A feast for all the senses. Maybe eye contact would be better. I look up into them and immediately regret it. They’re big and golden and deep, and they’re looking at me. I have no clue what’s happening. “You will wear this for me today, yes?” I nod. “Bene.” He walks back to the closet and pulls out a thin white button-down shirt and a pair of navy-blue shorts, then heads for the door. “Wait,” I say, shaking my head out of my daze. He stops just before he passes me. “What’s so special about today? Aren’t we just working?” Darren said he was coming back today and would pop by the restaurant, but we didn’t set a specific time. I assumed I’d be at work all day. “Later, yes,” he says quietly, leaning in like we’re coconspirators. “First, I am taking you on my boat.” I get pulled into the conspiracy and lean in too. “Your boat?” “My boat.” He’s even closer now, still shirtless. His clothes are just an afterthought of wadded-up laundry in his hands. It’s probably such a chore for him to put them on every day. He’s clearly in his element without them. Chiara did say that I had to see Cinque Terre from the sea, that there’s nothing else like it. The anticipation of the photo ops alone is enough to make my answer “Si, si, si,” forget about the half-naked guy standing in front of me. Forget about his lips, inches from mine. Forget that he has his own boat in Italy. “Where are we going?” I stare at his mouth, waiting for an answer. He smirks and I’m pretty sure I’ll follow him anywhere. Bruno traces my jaw with a fingertip and lightly taps the tip of my nose. “You will see.

I loved my dish towel. This one was two-toned, and had, on one side, stitchings of fat purple roses on a lavender background, and on the other side, fat lavender roses on a purple background. Which side to use? An optical-illusion namesake with which I could dry our dishes. It was soft and worn and smelled like no-nonsense laundry detergent.

If Alessandro and Rosy are working from a disadvantage in terms of product recognition, they have put generations of accumulated experience into practice to fill the menu with dozens of little tastes of Como. They make fragrant, full-flavored stocks from the bones and bodies of perch and chub. They cure whitefish eggs in salt, creating a sort of freshwater bottarga, ready to be grated over pasta and rice. Shad is brined in vinegar and herbs, whitefish becomes a slow-cooked ragù or a filling for ravioli, and pigo and pike form the basis of Mella's polpettine di pesce, Pickled, dried, smoked, cured, pâtéd: a battery of techniques to ensure that nothing goes to waste. If you can make it with meat, there's a good chance Alessandro and Rosy have made it with lake fish. And then there's missoltino, the lake's most important by-product, a staple that stretches back to medieval times and has been named a presidio by Slow Food, a designation reserved for the country's most important ingredients and food traditions. The people still making missoltino can be counted on a single hand. Alessandro guts and scales hundreds of shad at a time, salts the bodies, and hangs them like laundry to dry under the sun for forty-eight hours or more. The dried fish are then layered with bay leaves, packed into metal canisters, and weighed down. Slowly the natural oils from the shad escape and bubble to the surface, forming a protective layer that preserves the missoltino indefinitely. It can be used as a condiment of sorts, a weapons-grade dose of lake umami to be detonated in salads and pastas. In its most classic preparation, served with toc, a thick, rich scoop of polenta slow cooked in a copper pot over a wood fire, it tastes of nothing you've eaten in Italy- or anywhere else.

At midmorning the next day, she stood out by the line, hanging the laundry up to dry. But when she reached into the basket for the last item, a worn, moss-green shirt, she found it empty. Looking up, she saw the little fox holding the shirt in its mouth. It leapt, dropping the shirt, then picked it up again.

It seems I have not been truly myself for a long time,” he says, barely whispering, a dry, papery sound like files shuffling in a dead document archive.