Eileen Loveman Daily Posting

I am notorious for overloading the washing machine. 
 
A throwback from the days when I had 4 sets of small shirts and tiny jeans, little sweat suits and tiny sweaters, I never took into consideration that the size of the clothes my children were wearing happened to be growing at the same rate they were.   The result was an inevitable rocking and rolling of an unbalanced hunk of metal walking out to my kitchen, and the wailing of my kids alerting me yet again with a chaotic “Mommeee!  The WASHER!” 
 
Every now and then I would call Sears and ask them to send someone out to replace the agitator head; but no one was more agitated more than I was.   Why couldn’t someone invent a washing machine that would expand another 5 or 6 inches all around when you needed it to?  Why is that socks and underwear had no problem, but sweaters always wound up wrung like a dish towel or wrapped around a pant leg like a psychotic maypole?
 
As the years went by and they started to do their own laundry,  I was much less inclined to overload the washer, simply because I was using it less and dry cleaning more.  My clothes always seemed to fit fine, no matter how much I stuffed them in there.  
 
So it was with a heavy heart when I heard my beloved rustling around in the laundry room the other day, sighing and humming, a sure sign he was figuring out how to ask me something without sounding accusing. 
 
“Sweetie?” he asked as I started to think about the last thing I washed in the machine.  My mind quickly went to the comforter and the dish towels and the extra pillow cases I threw in at the last minute……
 
“Have you been overloading the washing machine again?”  and I knew the hour of truth was upon us.  “The agitator doesn’t seem to be agitating…”
 
“Let’s call Martin and see what’s going on.” 
 
Holding my breath I later learned it was not the agitator gone bad, but the fact we have a water softener installed.  The salt from the system wears down the mechanisms and they simply rot away.
 
I had time to ponder all this as I sat in the Laundromat the other day, watching the clothes go round and round in the front loader.   My new washer won’t be in until Thursday.
 
I’m still thinking about that expandable washing machine I need to invent.  Lucky for me my dogs don’t wear sweaters.