In a recent Baby Blues cartoon, a child is watching his mother put clothes into the washing machine. He says, “Another load? You must really love doing laundry.”

She replies, “Golly! I sure do! The constant gathering, sorting, washing, and folding truly feeds my soul. All those years of college have finally paid off!”

In another cartoon, a woman stands staring at a basket of laundry. She says, “That basket of laundry has been sitting there for so long I can’t remember if it’s clean or dirty.” She ponders for a moment, then says, “If it’s clean, I’ll have to fold it and put it away.” After another moment, she says, “It must be dirty.”

Boy, did I relate to those cartoons! One of my least favorite jobs (among many) is laundry, especially gathering, folding, and putting away clothes. I’m always happy when I don’t have permanent press clothes in the dryer that need to be hung up immediately. But I pay for the privilege of throwing everything from the dryer into a basket to deal with “later.” Depending on the mood I’m in, “later” may mean in the next few minutes or the next few weeks. Generally, “later” comes when I can’t find two matching socks in my sock drawer, so I need to dig something out of the basket. This is a hassle, as trying to uncover two matching socks in a mountain of clothes is like finding the proverbial needle in a haystack. At that point, I may give in and fold everything in the basket. But since I usually feel I’ve accomplished enough from simply managing to get everything into the washer and out of the dryer, I give myself a break from having the added burden of folding and putting laundry away on the same day. One can only take so much laundry duty in a given period of time.

Consequently, my clean laundry often sits in a basket in the laundry room, or if I’m overly ambitious, I manage to lug the basket upstairs to sit on a chair or my desk in my bedroom where I won’t “forget it.” I have somehow convinced myself that if I place a basket full of laundry where I have to see it constantly, I will manage to do something about it. But that’s just a little lie I tell myself. Besides, my cats love lying in the baskets of clean laundry. If I delay folding and putting the clothes away for too long, I have to rewash everything because it’s covered in cat hair. But having learned that lesson the hard way (several times), I’ve gotten smart, and now I place a beach towel over the top of the basket. The cats still nest in the baskets, but the towel keeps the items underneath it clean. Usually. Sometimes, the cats rearrange the towel to suit themselves, leaving unprotected clean clothes. But, seriously, what’s a little cat hair? Occasionally, I’ll find an item that should have been hung up out of the dryer at the bottom of the laundry pile. It automatically goes into the dirty laundry.

I wouldn’t mind folding laundry so much if people in my house didn’t aggravate me by turning socks and T-shirts inside out when they take them off. Younger Son, in particular, often leaves his socks in a ball that probably never got clean in the washer to start with, but I don’t care. If they are in the clean basket, I untangle them, attempt to make the best matches, and let them go. If I’m in a magnanimous frame of mind, I might even turn the socks and T-shirts right-side out. If not, I fold them inside out and let the wearer deal with the consequences. No one in my family seems to care about the way their clothes are worn. As for me, I take my clothes off the correct way so I don’t have the added steps.

I know what you’re probably thinking. How can I possibly complain about laundry when I have a modern, high-capacity washer and dryer? It’s not like I have to take clothes down to the river and beat them on a rock, then hang them on a clothesline and hope it doesn’t rain. I would try to explain it to you, but right now, I have to hustle downstairs to remove permanent press clothing from the dryer before it wrinkles. If there’s one chore I dislike more than doing laundry, it’s ironing.