My clothes hamper is nearly full, suggesting a trip to the laundromat tomorrow. Something I’m not looking forward to, on account of the snow and the state of my car’s tires.
And also, I never feel entirely comfortable at the laundromat. It’s such a disagreeably public setting.
Other people, casting furtive glances at my dirty clothes. My socks. My t-shirts. My underwear. Judging me.
I didn’t actually understand why I always felt uncomfortable at the laundromat, until this morning. I had been blaming my uneasiness on the ‘Laundromat Modern’ decor — the lemon yellow walls and the bright red Formica counters, set off by white enameled machines.
Or maybe, I thought, my discomfort was due to the dreary thumping of the dryers… thump, thump, thump… like jungle drums beaten by a band of slightly drunk musicians.
But this morning, as I tossed a couple of items into the clothes hamper, it suddenly struck me. I’m ashamed of my dirty clothes. Even though they’re not, technically, dirty.
The clothes hamper itself is part of the problem. I inherited my clothes hamper from my dear mother — one of the precious items she left me in her will. It’s the same clothes hamper she bought me when I left for college. Not all of my college roommates had been provided with clothes hampers, and I suspect some of them were jealous of mine, because instead of leaving my dirty clothes in a pile in the corner of the room, my ‘used’ clothing was neatly hidden away.
I wasn’t particularly fond of the flowers, but at least the hamper wasn’t completely pink.
Mom taught me, at a young age, to throw my clothes into the hamper when I took them off in the evening. That made a lot of sense, because I was a rough and tumble kid growing up, and by day’s end, my clothes were pretty well covered in dirt and mud, and other equally unpleasant substances. Her training stayed with me. Even though I no longer play in the dirt, I still take off my clothes in the evening and toss them into the hamper.
But the clothes I now toss into my hamper are, by any scientific measurement, completely unsoiled. As far as I can tell, my clothes are also untainted by viruses, considering that I haven’t left my bedroom in the past two weeks.
My dirty clothes are not, in any real sense, “dirty”. Why — and I am honestly asking you — why would a grown man toss perfectly clean clothes into the hamper, instead of folding them, or hanging them on a hanger, and placing them back into the location from whence they came?
My only explanation… I can sense my mother, may she rest in peace, looking down from heaven and watching me. “Louis,” I hear her say (usually in my left ear), “You’ve worn these clothes all day. Into the hamper they go.”
A trained psychologist could probably offer a cogent and convincing explanation for my behavior.
I took a psychology class myself, in 12th grade — not because I had to, but because the teacher was cute — and I have my own theory. I am basically ashamed of my clothes, and I feel uncomfortable looking at them. It’s not so much of a problem when I am wearing them, because I’m usually focused on other things, like a plate of spaghetti or a YouTube video. Assuming I didn’t spill spaghetti sauce on my shirt, I hardly even notice that I’m wearing my clothes. (It’s safer to watch YouTube than to eat spaghetti, in terms of keeping your clothes clean. But a man does not live by YouTube alone.)
When I take my clothes off in the evening, however, I can plainly see that I am no longer wearing them. There they are: previously worn clothes.
Clothes that I wrapped around my body. Now objects of shame, to be hidden away.
I recall the sad events that took place in the Garden of Eden.
Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths.
The story doesn’t mention a clothes hamper. I guess that came later.