Those symbols have taken the fun out of washday

Press, 26 November 1982, Page 14

Those symbols have taken the fun out of washday

Technology has been defined as the knack of so arranging the world that we don’t have to experience, it. And technology, in the form’ of the automatic washing machine, enables us to handle our domestic laundry work so that we don’t actually have to do any. Once I lived in Rangoon where there were no washing machines. There was only the elbow power of the dhobis. Everything we wore was either washable or it rapidly disintegrated. “Washable”, then meant capable of being pounded on smooth stones, starched with rice i&ater, dried in the fierce heat of the Burmese sun, then pressed exquisitely with irons heated by charcoal and controlled, not by thermostats but by the degree of sizzle in the dhobi’s

JOAN CURRY

By

spit. All this was accomplished without any effort from me. Dirty clothes dropped on the floor ope night were returned the next day clean and crackling with starch. It’s no wonder I believed, in magic in those days. Then I found out, first hand, how it was done and the magic disappeared, as magic always does. “Washable” came to mean capable of being transformed from dirty to clean by a great deal of scrubbing and tubbing by me.

The advent of our first agitator washing machine was greeted with hysterical relief and a determination that henceforth technology could take over.

And technology did take over — magnificently — with the arrival of the new

automatic. It requires only that I insert clothing and push buttons . before going away to do something interesting while it magically does all the work. That, at least, is the theory. Because now we have these. labels containing instructions which limit the magic. If our clothes must be separated into piles,Ahis pile to be washed at 30deg C, that pile at 90deg C, this item to be hand-washed in lukewarm water, these two cold-rinsed, those over there allowed a medium-wash but not spun, what then is the use of our all-purpose automatic washing machine? It seems .that we forgot to tell the garment manufacturers about the new technology. Or perhaps we should suggest that the makers of the washing machines supply

computers with their products.

I appreciate the efforts made by the manufacturers of clothing and fabrics to label their goods so that we can take proper care of them. I appreciate the fact that they have co-operated in devising a standard labelling code.

I realise that if I disregard their advice it is my own fault if the garment is ruined. That lets the manufacturers off the hook, and hoists me up there instead. And I am liable to end up with a pile of temperamental clothing that won’t go into my machine. Washing clothes by hand is boring, and it seems to me that technology should have progressed beyond that level. We may be spoilt by the sophisticated equipment to

which we have become accustomed, but it isn’t fair to show us the goodies and then tell us we can't use them. Everything in our house must be “washable,” whatever the labels say: That is,

it must be capable of being washed in our automatic washing machine without any help from me. After several years ot a stubborn adherence to this policy, we have very few clothes left but at least they

are all wasnaoie. Anything less and I consider that technology has let me down. Anything less and I might as well go back to the tub and give everything my individual attention. And where’s the magic in that?