THE ZEN OF HAND WASHING CLOTHES

The ordinary acts we practice everyday at home are of more importance to the soul than their simplicity might suggest.        Thomas Moore

Five years ago, one of the simple things I started doing when I downsized and moved to my tiny apartment, was hand washing my clothes. 

I began doing this because schlepping my clothes to the laundromat once a week has never appealed to me. This is the first time in my life, since my early 20s, that I have been required to go to the laundromat, having always the luxury of a washer and dryer. A luxury I didn't fully appreciate until I didn't have it. And so it goes. 


When I downsized drastically five years ago, I knew I was going to have to sacrifice having my own washer and dryer for awhile. I would, as a dear friend calls it, have to "monk it out" for awhile. 


One of the ways I'm doing that is hand washing my clothes. On Sunday afternoons, I gather and sort my clothes into little piles, and prepare to wash them for the next week of work. The activity has become like a Zen practice for me. I almost like doing it. Really.

COMFORT FOOD

Comfort food is wonderful, is it not? Hot and delicious on a cold day, like a bowl of homemade soup or a roasted chicken or a steaming bowl of pasta, mmm, or warm cookies. Hungry yet?

I have some favorites, like everyone else, but many of my comfort foods are attached to memories - maybe that's why some foods are comforting to us, they remind us of happy times or people who are dear to us. Some foods, like mac and cheese, or meatloaf, or spaghetti, or even hot cocoa made from cocoa and sugar, have attached to them distinct memories of childhood, a great time we spent with a friend, or maybe the first meal we prepared of a boyfriend (girlfriend).