Do you remember: Washing Day Monday

Do you remember: Washing day Monday

30 July 2020

12:03

Washing Day Monday

 

Lines of washing across the street

Blowing in the breeze

Shirts and pants

Even a sheet

 

Early Monday morning

Early they rise
Fill the cauldron set in bricks
Have breakfast until it is boiling

 

Go for the washing gather bits up

Sort them out

Whites and coloured

Open the mangle and set it up

 

Wash tub filed with water from the set pot

Soap powder and white clothes  in the tub

Swish them stamp them with the 'Dolly' stick

Lift them out with wooden tongs - they are so hot

  

Into s wash tub of hot water under the mangle

Swish them about for a rinse

Lift them out pass through the hand wound mangle

Undo any tangle

 

Coloureds items now follow

Each is placed in the wash basket

Follow with coloureds

Greasy clothes their turn now

 

More hot water to the tub

Bit more powder

Greasy clothes

Need a scrub

 

Rub hard soap on the cuffs and neck

On the wash board

Let them soak

Another scrubbing, what the heck

 

Hang out the clothes that are done

Fire out from under the cauldron

Empty out the last drops

Almost finished - ready for some fun

 

Rinse the working clothes

Out they go on the line

All done tidy up

Perhaps have a drink and some toast

 

Wild Rose

July 2020

Reviews

[Lisasview]

Oh how I remember hanging clothes on the line... We had no dryer..
I hated it as a child..
Now we live in Spain and even though we have dyer we hand our clothes in the beautiful sun..or in winder on racks in front of the fire...and now I love it..
Life does change things.
Enjoyed your poem.. as I am drinking tea and honey.
Lisa, now in Spain

[Wild Rose]

Drinking tea and honey - How nice - and sitting in the sun. I presume.

Where about in Spain are you?-
We have had two winters in our camper van
Spain/Portugal
Where did you move from?
PeteC

[Lisasview]

Hi there Pete,
Well, it has rained and been rather cold for about a week here in Costa Blanca North..
We moved from living in a house we built on the beach near Santa Barbara,,

[Betty Hermelee]

This is making me tired, with all the new high tech stuff for washing; we almost don't think about it anymore; it's brain-less , but then it was an all day affair. and, you show us in great detail exactly how the process works, from the hot water to the white clothes, then the colored clothes and the squeezing of the clothes; it's quite a chore and you do a good job of showing us the olden days. We need to look back sometimes!
Best to you,
B>

[Wild Rose]

Thank you Betty
Yes just shove the lot into the washer unsorted. Fill the powder slide-out close all the doors and hatches, select the wash cycle.
Make a drink and sit down for the allotted time.

The youngsters, don't know they are born.
Do they?

[Betty Hermelee]

Exactly! You're very welcome

[Pete]

double bubble toil and trouble. now that surely is a lot of work. amazing compared to today. this was a delightful read so cleverly crafted. please don't ask me to fluff and fold or iron. bravo ... :)

[Wild Rose]

Thanks, Pete
Hubble bubble Put in the dolly blue
Dolly Blue to make them white?
How does that work
Ah well my chemistry set never worked as the said it would
Peg it out on the line all on a breazzy day

[Carlos Lorenzo Estrada]

What a delightful poem that takes me back to the early 70s when I watched my grandmother washing and hanging clothes in the backyard. She would often sing or hum old Spanish love songs. Thank you for sharing this wonderful poem with us.

[Wild Rose]

We live in a street house (Like Coronation Street - If you have seen the program) Lines of washing across the street
Thank for the comment
Would love to hear some of grannies love songs > even though I don't know much Spanish

[barleygirl]

I was born on a farm, the last of nine kids, & my mom worked outside the home as a hairdresser (hard being on her feet all day) then she comes home to churn cream into butter by hand, wash all those clothes on a washboard, etc. Thank you for celebrating all the old ways, which is a tribute to the long-suffering of women thru-out history (((HUGS)))

[Wild Rose]

Thanks. Margie.
Dont you think. times were hard in those days. and they just accepted it _ It had to be done. That was life.

[emmajoy]

Memories of a regular and somehow wonderful routine.. plus Cumbrian reality. What a true picture of days past and times perhaps to emulate. A spotlessly realistic mantra! There should be a hundred reviews here!

[Wild Rose]

Thank you
West Yorkshire in those days > but I think it could have been anywhere
The streets lined with all manner of clothing blowing, flapping in the breeze

[emmajoy]

These days, not everyone likes to hang out their laundry in public plus, in the past, people washed their p's and q's !