It All Comes Out In The Wash

There are some good things about having an empty nest - lots of "me" time, quiet evenings, a smaller grocery bill.  But there is one thing that is NOT helpful...
Your husband finds out what you are really like.  As there are no kids around to distract him, he notices your idiosyncrasies.  And there is no one else to blame for how the car keys got into the refrigerator, or the fact that his "special pen" that he uses to write in his journal every night somehow got on YOUR nightstand.
Let's take the laundry as an example.
When Hubby stopped coaching, he had time to notice that our clothes don't actually wash themselves, and he decided to "help me out" by learning how to work the washer and dryer.  I was happy to indulge him.
Hubby has A System.
1.  Gather ALL the dirty laundry.
This is a nice idea, but early on in our marriage/family I figured out that this overwhelms me.  I am a small person, and by the time I finished lugging the 13th basket of dirty clothes into the laundry room, the pile threatened to topple over onto me, smothering me and absorbing my decomposing body before my young children or Coaching Hubby would even miss me.  Until someone ran out of underwear, of course.  But since Hubby only started doing laundry after the kids were gone, he thinks my fear of the "dirty" pile is silly.  My "system" of going from room to room, picking up random socks, a hand towel, two pairs of jeans, and a pillowcase, does not make sense to him.
2.  Sort ALL the dirty laundry.
As much as Hubby loves my quirky little habit of dropping my wrung out wash cloths over the top of the shower door onto the floor, creating a cute little pile of dried-up laundry "dog bones" by the end of the week, he thought he could improve on it.  He placed a basket in the bathroom.  But that wasn't good enough.  In a flash of brilliance, he realized if he placed TWO baskets in there, I could toss the towels and wash cloths in one and our colored clothes in the other one.   Voila!  His laundry is sorted before he even gathers it up!
I try.  I really do.  But my aim is not that good.  So when I toss my wrung out wash cloth over the shower wall in the direction of the basket, sometimes it makes it and sometimes... well, let's just say Hubby's system still needs the kinks worked out.
3.  Wash and dry the dirty laundry.
Hubby likes to wash like things together.  By that, I mean, he does a load of towels, then a load of pants, then a load of shirts, then all the socks and undies together.  Which is fine...until you have to go get groceries and then come home and put them away and then clean the toilets and then its dark and you are tired and you want to watch a movie and then you forget that the laundry isn't done.
And that's how you end up walking around wearing clean pants with dirty undies and no socks.
4.  Put away ALL the clean laundry.
Clean towels in a basket are still clean towels.  But Hubby likes to feel a sense of completion.  So he doesn't consider the laundry "done" until everything is folded, hung on a hanger, and placed in the correct room.  Towels are easy.  You can carry the basket to the couch where you fold while you watch Netflix.  Colored clothes, however, need to be hung up directly from the hot dryer or else they get wrinkled.  And ironing is a subject for another post.  Which is code for "I don't do it."  So when the dryer beeps, telling me that it is almost finished with it's cycle and it will politely keep fluffing for 5 min but I better get in there soon, I run into the laundry room and hang up the things that are "high priority"...meaning, the wrinkles will show.  The other things get neatly spread out on TOP of the dryer, so they can cool down without being in a wrinkled ball.  This is partly due to the fact that I ran out of hangers and partly due to the fact that Netflix is on pause and I need to get this stupid chore done quickly.  I would happily just leave the jeans and pajama pants in the dryer if there wasn't an annoying load in the washer that wanted to get dried.
Oh, and by the way, clean clothes that are wrong side out are still clean clothes.  I see no problem with hanging up a tshirt wrong side out.  However it comes out of the dryer is how it goes on the hanger.
Hubby would NEVER let wrong side out clothes into his washer or dryer.
And let's not even get into what happens when I put his wrong-side-out pants in the "work shirts only" section of his closet.
So, in the spirit of compromise, we have decided that laundry will be Hubby's job, and I promise not to help.
Only, every now and then I can't help myself.  Something from the old days comes over me and I decide to wash the bedsheets on a non-bedsheet washing day.  Which means I have to move those dry clothes out of the dryer.  And put those socks and undies into the dryer.  And 3 loads later...
Hubby (in his patient voice) "Honey, did you clean out the dryer lint?"
Me (sipping coffee) "...."
Him (Charlie Brown Teacher Voice) "Waaa wa waaaaa wah..."
But all I hear is how much he loves me.
And in the end, it all comes out in the wash.

Stretched

I've decided to take up yoga.
Anyone who knows me knows I hate most kinds of physical exercise, but yoga seemed like something that fit with my desire to be lithe and limber while listening to soothing music and not breaking a sweat.
So I searched YouTube for "yoga for beginners", picked a video at random, and tried to follow the directions of the teeny bopper in tights who was effortlessly bending herself into geometric shapes.  My body refused.  So I got into Grab the Remote Pose and changed my search to "yoga for inflexible people who are trying it for the very first time".
And that's how I found Jen and her "Safe Stretches for Beginners" video.  Jen moved slowly.  And was completely non-judgemental.  She demonstrated each pose and then explained how to supplement with pillows, rolled up hand towels, and modified movements for those of us who are just starting out and have "tight" shoulders, hips, hamstrings....well, pretty much everything (except for things that are actually supposed to be tight - like the skin around my eyes).
Even with such a gentle instructor, the stretches felt awkward at first.  For a moment I thought, "Ow!  This hurts!"  And I wanted to stop immediately.  Holding the pose for a few seconds felt like enough and it was uncomfortable and I just wanted to pop back into my familiar bad posture.  But Jen said, "Just stay there.  And take deep breaths." And she stayed in her pose for twice as long as I thought was necessary.
And as I stayed there with her and took deep breaths, I realized something.
It didn't actually hurt.
Oh, I felt it for sure.  But it was really just...different.  Not painful. Just new.
And then she said, "As you breathe, you will soften into the stretch instead of resisting it.  And pretty soon you will be surprised at the improvement in your flexibility and range of motion."
And as I lay there with my cheek pressed into the carpet and my arm bent further back than I ever thought it could go, I knew she was so right.
Because, lately, life has put me in some positions that have stretched me in new ways.
My children's bedrooms no longer have dirty clothes on the floor and posters on the wall.  The furniture looks lonely and the rooms feel different.
And my husband, who has been home with me in the evenings for the past two years, is involved with coaching. My single dinner plate looks lonely and the table feels different.
Celebrations are changing, and the holidays feel different.
And at first, I want to say, "Stop!  This hurts and I don't like it.  Put it all back the old familiar way."
But I stay here, in the new position, and I breathe.
And it doesn't hurt.  Not really.  It feels weird, awkward, unfamiliar, new.
But I stay.
And I breathe.
And I stop resisting.
And eventually, the new feels more comfortable.
I sit in my favorite chair and read an entire book in one evening without any guilt.
I accept an invitation to a friend's "cookie party" without having to check my kids' activity schedules.
I laugh at emails and texts from my husband throughout the day and I smile in the dark as he climbs into bed late beside me, regaling me with what happened at the game.
I think about joining the community choir.
I am surprised at my new flexibility and range of motion.
Jen says other stuff too.  When she is relaxing into her stretches she says things like "..a nice stretch" and "..that feels really great."  I am starting to know what she means.
You know, many years ago, when I was doing Pilates (yoga's angry cousin) my kids sat on the couch and howled with laughter at my attempts at The Seal.
But now the living room is blessedly silent.
I breathe, and soften into it.