Sans Fig Leaf

Previous
Index
Next

Email

w

"Sorting laundry"

30 September, 2003

Most Sundays I do the laundry. The first step is sorting the laundry. I understand that in the modern era of colorfast dyes and cold temperature detergents, sorting laundry is not as important as it once was. But I grew up in an era when failure to sort laundry invariably led to one's required white gym clothes turning pastel pink. And once you've been forced to wear pink gym clothes until Dad's next payday, you never forget it.

So I sort laundry.

Once when I mentioned laundry-sorting to a younger acquaintance, they were completely flabbergasted about the idea. Why would one sort? And how do you pick which things to put together? So I tried to explain how you might put a light blue shirt in a load along with a brand new dark red garment. Some of the red dye might bleed out of the new garment and discolor all the others. Parts of the light blue shirt might turn a sort mottled, muddy purple. A white blouse in the same load might turn pink, that sort of thing. But if you only washed the red garment with other garments from the same area of the spectrum, any dye that bled out wouldn't be noticable on other red, burgundy, or purple clothes.

"But purple is at the other end of the spectrum from red," the person argued. "And it's a different color altogether. Wouldn't it turn pink, too?"

So I tried to explain about the color wheel, and how, when you're talking about dyes or pigments, you can make some colors by blending two others. The person was very confused, apparently having never seen a color wheel (and I guess never played with water colors as a kid, either). "Red is red and blue is blue and I don't believe you can mix them and get anything but red and blue!" he declared.

Several conversations and discussions I've been in over the last several months have reminded me of that very close-minded way of looking at the world.

For example, I had someone tell me some months back that I shouldn't offer advice to a married acquaintance because I'm not married myself. Never mind that I have been married. Never mind that my ex-wife is one of my best friends and we have a relationship that's a million times more functional than this other's person's relationship is with their spouse. Never mind that Michael and I have done everything the law will allow us to in regard to getting married: we have registered our partnership, we have signed other legal documents the bind us to sharing expenses, and so forth. The only reason we aren't married is because the state won't let us. "It's not the same thing," the person insisted. That might be true, but only in the sense that no relationship is exactly like any other.

In a completely different setting, someone was asserting that straight people just "can never understand what it's like for a gay person living in a homophobic society." Even when I pointed out that he had many times proclaimed his own opinions on straight people, and therefore obviously believed that he could imagine how a straight person might feel in a given situation, he still insisted. "It's just not the same. There isn't a middle ground on some things!"

Or the many conversations in the various hobby groups I'm associated which basically boil down to, "Those guys are just too weird to understand! How can someone spend all their time obsessing about widgets? By the way, have I shown you the new display case I just built into the walls of my house for my enormous gizmo collection? Did I tell you I was thinking of legally changing my name to Gizmo?" And heaven help me if I admit that I'm a fan of both widgets and gizmos! Because, while the widget lovers may be sick, pathetic losers while the gizmo enthusiasts are nice right-minded folks, someone who tries to be in both camps is both pathetic and a traitor.

I just don't see things that compartmentalized, I guess.

Trends emerge as I sort our laundry. When Michael and I first began living together, the laundry tended to sort out into: one big pile of whites, an equally large pile of blacks and greys, a medium-sized pile of bright colors, a small pile of dark colors, and a small pile of earth tones. I'd usually then combine the earth tones with one of the colors, and wash. The last year the color distribution has skewed off into a new direction. Most weeks there is a very large pile of purples & reds, a medium pile of blacks and greys, a small pile of blues & greens, a small pile of earth tones, a tiny pile of whites, and then an odd one or two that don't fit into any of the other piles.

The changes in which colors dominate our wardrobe are the result of many factors, not just our personal taste. I happen to like some colors better than others. But I also like variety. And some days I'm in the mood to wear black, while other days I feel like bright blue.

The decisions of which colors go together isn't as cold and scientific as my color wheel explanation makes it sound. Sometimes the blues are washed with the greens. Sometimes they go with the purples. Sometimes they go with the greys. It depends on the blue--and on what is in the other piles, and my mood that day. In the end, they're all just clothes that need to be washed, dried, folded, and put away.

And similarly people aren't distintively different things that can easily be divided into categories like "married," "gay," "trekkie," "jock," et cetera. We're all just people, living our lives.