LAUNDRY AT THE OLD HAUNT

I have a wicked flashback today.

No, it's not induced by LSD (I'm not Timothy Leary, for chrissakes), nor weed, nor alcohol, nor stress, nor terror.  It's all because of a laundromat.

As teenagers, sometimes we would hang out in the local laundromat while our lucky emancipated pals did their laundry, or we'd pop in for protection if it were raining/snowing outside.  Later, when we got our own places, we became the entertainment to the younger generation of teens trying to avoid the weather and sheer boredom. 

Today my schedule is interrupted by three loads of laundry that must be done.  I finish one load, start the dryer, and pop in load #2.  My washing machine is acting hinky; it stops whenever it feels like it, and I have to Mickey Mouse the water cycles in two spots now.  I am running up and down the stairs, back and forth to the machine, when I notice the dryer is acting hinky, too.

I suspect a belt snapped because the drum is no longer moving.

I push through the washing machine two medium-sized loads of laundry and toss the rest (sheets) back into the hamper.  Dress shirts that my son wears to work, along with one pair of pants, get hung up to air dry.  So does my bathing suit.  The rest of the washed and wet and wrung-out clothing gets folded semi-neatly so I can haul it off down the street, fingers crossed that the old haunt still stands. 

My son, stopping home for lunch, does reconnaissance for me and claims the sign is still over the corner of the small group of shops near his office.  That doesn't necessarily mean that the place is still there, but it's a good sign.  I ask if he has any quarters to spare.  This is a fortuitous request as he is trading in his car tomorrow, so he has gone through his vehicle and collected all of the random change that has been collecting in his Lancer since junior year of high school.  The gallon-sized baggie probably contains $50 of change.  I steal three dollars worth of quarters, just in case... in case I am lucky and the place not only still exists but actually accepts quarters as tender.

The limited lot out front is packed with the lunch crowd for the attached pizza shop, so I park up the street and peer toward the building.  Beat up and a little grimy looking, the laundromat is still there.  I haul out the basket of damp laundry and walk it down the hill to the laundromat.

The first thing I notice is that there is still a piece of wood covering the glass pane closest to the locking door handle.  I don't know if this is more recent or a remainder from 1978.  I open the door and...

Good jesuschrist, the place still looks exactly the same.  Well, not "exactly" exactly.  An entire section of machines is missing, and the floor is all torn up.  Considering the tiny place was a hole-in-the-wall to start, it's more like a giant rat hole in the wall.

The washing machines that remain still have that familiar if unsettling lingering mildew stench.  The dryers seem the same but different.  There seem to be more of them.  I could swear there were only three or four before, and now there are twice that many.  I throw my clothes in, add a quarter, and see I get a whopping seven minutes.  I opt for twenty-one minutes on medium heat and settle in for a fun afternoon.

A half hour later, all of my laundry is dry, or mostly dry.  One thick towel and some waistbands are still slightly damp, but the laundry isn't burned like it used to be.  Back in the day, the dryers had one setting, regardless of what the signs said: Nuclear Core Meltdown Mode.  All laundry dried with lava-like heat, making it impossible to fold anything without being scalded, and everything had a charred scent to it.

No matter.  I am thankful for dryers close enough to my house that I can survive a few days.  Truly there is little point in fixing the dryer.  It has been wheezing and squeaking for over a year now, and the washer isn't far behind.  I've gotten a couple of decades out of those old machines, and it's probably time to replace them anyway.

In the meantime, though, I'll suffer through the flashbacks and take my laundry to the old haunt.  Besides, it's kind of fun doing laundry with the ghosts.