Hanging Out Day, April 19th
Do you go the extra mile to hang your laundry out to dry? I have a somewhat decrepit fold-up wooden drying rack which I've had since I went away to college in September of 1997. Yes, it's old. But it works just fine. My friend C helped me repair it two years ago, when the piece that sort of clamps down over the top dowel/rung to keep it upright broke. We made a sort of splint, and affixed it with wood glue, and it's as good as new.

My mother loves laundry lines. She thinks they're beautiful, and I agree. I took a monoprinting class at the art museum in Worcester, a few years after graduating college, and made a print with chine colle (anyone know how to insert special symbols into LJ? That final 'e' needs an accent aigu) of a clothesline; my mom had it framed, and it hangs now in my parents' house. Growing up with the ritual/task of hanging laundry outside to dry (or in the basement on a line strung up across the room near the washing machine) helped me appreciate them more. Clotheslines are practical, as they reduce use of fuels to run a clothes dryer; but they're also just interesting. I am one of those people who find many aspects of domestic life fascinating, both personally (I sometimes find doing the dishes and other menial tasks to be calming) and from a sociological point of view.  Just as a person's grocery store purchases might reveal a lot about them, looking at a clothesline can tell a lot about a person or family.

Thanks to birdnerd1 for telling me about this upcoming Hanging Out Day, on April 19th, the aim of which is partially to educate people about the benefits of clotheslines. This organization also deals with legislation which in some places prevents (gasp!) people from hanging out laundry. Whenever my family took a trip (always car trips), we would drive through all the boroughs of NYC, and there were lots of interesting clotheslines hanging in view of the Long Island Expressway or whatever it's called when it wends its way through the city. Urban art, I tell you! 

I don't have an outdoor line - here in Texas it's often too humid. But the point is to eschew the use of additional resources when a little planning and patience will do the job just fine. Yeah, fabrics dried on a rack or line do feel a bit crunchy sometimes, but it's nothing that a few minutes on the body won't take care of; our elbows and hips and scapulae effectively iron out our clothes for us!  There are other perks mentioned on the site which I've experienced personally. Specifically, when I do laundry at night, I prefer to hang it on the rack, because that way I don't have to wait up for the dryer to finish; neither will the clothes sit in the dryer all night and get all wrinkly. And yes, our dryer does have a tumble feature, but that means it's tumbling all night, which uses energy, however minimal. Here's another perk: if you hang your shirts (for me, scrub tops) on hangers to dry, you can put them away in your closet with no extra work! Oh, and did I mention that drying on a rack or clothesline puts less wear and tear on your clothes? You'll get more mileage out of them. I admit that this is not a draw for fashionistas whose wardrobes seem to have turnover comparable to that of the epidermis, but I don't think any of those types read my journal.