“And if you say I’m being punished. Ain’t he got better things to do?”*
Posted on September 3, 2006 - Filed Under Uncategorized
*Drive By Truckers, “Putting People on the Moon”
Because we’re moving, we no longer have a washer and dryer in the house. The dirtying of clothes does not cease, however. Therefore, I find myself in a coin laundry at the moment. I haven’t had to use of these in a very long time. From what my memory told me, I thought I could expect TVs and fairly reasonable prices. I was disappointed on both fronts. I first went to one on Sweeten Creek and every washer in the place was being used. I didn’t want to wait but the main reason I left was how crowded it was. I didn’t check the prices but there wasn’t a single TV in the whole place. So, I ended up at another one over on Smokey Park Highway. Again, not a single television. I should mention here tha this is important because I have some ironing I need to do and it’s always a lot better if I can do it while I’m watching TV. Figuring I might as well settle down, I chose a pair of washers, set my stuff down, and looked at the price. $1.75 to wash a load of clothes; drying is $.25 for 8 minutes. Pretty crazy! My family spent a lot of time each in these places and I don’t remember things seeming that expensive. No wonder poor people are poor.
People in these places always seem to have the same look of desperation on their faces. Maybe it’s the fact they’re doing laundry. I actually enjoy washing clothes but I suppose that’s just one more thing that makes me weird. More likely of an explanation is their station in life. Having to budget money every week, maybe $10, to ensure you and your family have clean clothes is not a whole lot of fun. Or maybe it’s the inherent lack of privacy. What person lucky enough to have a normal mental constitution enjoys folding their underwear in front of God and everyone? I suppose for some folks this is humiliating, depending on how one processes this kind of thing. It would be interesting to research and write an ethnography of laundromats. I bet the finding would be that the patrons are really just like everyone else except they don’t have nearly as much of that one thing—money.
I wonder what the other people in here think of me as I sit here on my little computer, typing away. If they don’t have the resources to own their own laundry equipment, it seems a pretty safe assumption they also don’t have computers. Some of them are probably wondering what the heck I am doing here. Kind of ironic and a bit instructive about life: just because you’re washing clothes in a coin laundry, driving a broken down car, in need of a haircut, etc. doesn’t entitle those around you to cast judgments about you. They don’t know what your situation is. Also, the laundromat illustrates a favorite idea of mine: There but for the grace of God go I. Anyone of us, at virtually any moment in our lives, could find ourselves down and out. We should be more grateful for what we have and not hold it above others as though it makes us better than them. After all, it doesn’t, it really doesn’t.
There’s a lot of people out there who think poor people are just lazy and don’t deserve the slightest bit of pity or even sympathy. I haven’t completly worked out how I feel but, having come from that situation, I do know that the last thing you want to hear is you could make your situation better if you just wanted to. I think that people who think/say this are some of the world’s biggest ingrates. They have no idea how hard most poor people work to get what little they do. They also take for granted (and I mean that literally…most people I have met who feel this way think they are somehow entitled to what they have) their good fortune, which really ticks me off. I know a guy at work like this. You’d think he thinks he’s the most awesome thing going because he has a little bit of money and that those who have none are the scum of the Earth. The two horrible things about this are the fact that he calls himself a Christian and he wouldn’t have a penny of that money if he hadn’t married into it. Honestly, I think it all goes back to our evolutionary roots. We all need to know what seperates us from the other clans and groups. Money is our modern day distinguishing agent and it makes it oh so easy to dismiss others.
I’m really glad to not be poor. I’m really glad I don’t have to come here to wash my clothes. But I’m also sad anyone does.
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