I use a multi-pile system common among my peers, mothers-avoiding-laundry-by-making-it-a-daily-burden.  My piles consist of 1) dirty clothes on the bathroom floor (also known as doggy bedding); 2) clean clothes in the laundry basket (sometimes confused as dirty clothes and thus, also known as doggy bedding); 3) clothes in dryer, still damp and; 4) washed clothes left in washing machine that stink (like the doggy bedding).  

I own four additional laundry baskets, handy for use by my children as mini-shelters, boats and concave stepstools.  Not for dirty clothes. 
We have plenty of dirty clothes.  There’s my husband’s sweat-drenched tennis wear, my son’s shirt with the sleeve used to wipe his runny nose, my three-year-old daughter’s dress dipped in toilet water, the baby’s outfit soiled at both ends and my clothes, which the baby soiled at both ends. 

As we mothers know, doing laundry garners no respect.  Family members want to know which clothes are clean, yet gag when you sniff seams.  My washing machine understands.  Angrily bouncing about, it’s demanding at least one day without clothes in it, on top of it or encircling it.  When I announced that my estranged machine and I are on strike, my concerned husband asked, “Hon, are my pants dried yet?” 

Even Hollywood recognizes laundry’s psychotic effects as represented by the movie The Mangler, which is described as “a laundry machine possessed by a bloodthirsty demon.”  I caught this movie on late night television as I was folding socks, socks, and the usual sock.  A friend of mine had a similar story, although her machine was not commercial-grade and didn’t eat people. 

She agitated her washing machine to the point where it had attempted an escape.  The machine broke from the wall, conspired with the hose to flood the second floor compartment (some home builders, in their infinite wisdom, put water-guzzling five-ton machines UPSTAIRS) and leaped through the sopped floor into the garage.  My friend arrived home from work to find her garage door flapping frantically for help.  The appliance didn’t make it. 

So here I am walking around in my husband’s briefs, prickly with pooch hair, and I come to the realization that I am not, and never will be, a laundry person.  My biceps ache from lifting and pouring concentrated detergent.  I have a growing pile of individual socks, buttons, coins, paper bits, which I’m sure held important lists and phone numbers in a previous life, plus some remnants I don’t recognize and don’t want to.  And I have trouble remembering all the little laundry details: colorful clothes should be washed in cold water, the dryer is not a friend of wool, lint build-up can catch on fire, and the dog must be removed before the spin cycle. 

In my house the clothes route from soiled to clean to ironed to closeted takes about a month.  A master laundress, my mother can do a week’s worth of my family’s laundry in eighty-two minutes flat.  White tees and dark sweaters, delicates and cotton, united in one cold-water soapfest.  As soon as the machine rumbles, mom dashes to set the kitchen timer for exactly twelve minutes.  Eleven minutes later, she waits impatiently for the machine buzz, loads up the dryer, sets the heat on high, and dashes back to reset the timer.