“I enjoy ironing.” Who said that? A voice among the four woman with wine glasses spoke up.
Oh, yes, it was me.
With apologies to my English teacher who would readily point out that the last sentence should be, “It was I”, I confessed a guilty secret passion. Ok, so it isn’t passion. At my age, passion is something related to dark chocolate, sleeping late and missed opportunities for a nap.
I do not enjoy what may be called “last minute emergency ironing”. Rather I enjoy taking a basket of wrinkled items and with a practiced hand and my Rowenta, turn them into pristine pieces of clothing or linens. There is a real sense of accomplishment attached to this, something not related to interpersonal relations, creativity, money or politics. As far as I know there are no ironing Olympics, no medals to be won for ironing. For me, it is that kind of thing that has a positive ending without the Greek chorus of doom drumming in my head pointing out how easy it will be to, as the kids say, “mess up.” Martha Stewart excepted, I do OK with an iron and, truth be told, it also frees me of some guilt while I am watching TV. On the negative side, my friends with the wine glasses have urged me to lie down and wait for this traitorous thought to dissipate.
I thought more about this homely chore, about the times that it has had some significance in my life. I clearly remember budgeting the thirty dollars that I had to buy things to take to college to include a radio, a coffee pot, a hot plate and an iron. I bought a tiny travel iron with a plastic bulb that allowed it to become, amazingly, a steam iron. On campus and among girls whose wardrobes were ten times the size of mine, I became a somebody because of that iron.
Those were the days when you could safely wander around in your underwear in the dorm because no males were allowed above the first floor. The mysteries of female life were contained therein and ironing one’s clothing was one of the minor rituals that we undertook as females in college. Those were the days when you wore dresses, skirts, blouses, sweaters, etc. just to go to class. Women were not allowed to wear trousers, jeans, shorts or even culottes. There was a rumor on campus that the Dean of Women had called some offending coeds into her office and warned them of expulsion if they disobeyed the dress code again. Truth be told, I never actually knew anyone who had been even campused (a punishment that required you to stay in the dorm for the evening) for wearing inappropriate attire, but we bought into the idea because it fit the picture of what we thought should be. It paralleled the male-female division of labor in the late ‘50’s.
Men on campus, on the other hand, wore anything they wanted. Women had curfews, the guys didn’t. Unfettered, the guys flunked out by the bus loads in their freshman year. The women did not because when they were not studying, they were back in their dorms ironing the collars of the blouses they wore under their sweaters so as to impress the guys who,on most days, looked like bleary eyed unmade beds. This also fit the picture of how things should be because there were few in those days who saw their education as preparation for a life time career, but rather as something to fall back on at some time after they had married, settled into their vine covered cottage or chic urban townhouse to raise their children and contribute to the betterment of their communities.
The iron, and in this case, my steam iron, thus became a critical part of the infrastructure that kept the gals on track toward their future goals, goals that involved attracting one of those rumpled males. I often think that it was that iron that got me into a sorority. It certainly wasn’t my wardrobe or my pedigree.
I, having ironed a lot, graduated, worked, gotten married, had children, continued working and continued to iron clothes. Sunday nights during Murder She Wrote and depending on how much ironing I had to do, the shows that followed, I ironed. At some point I had to buy a new iron. With my penchant for forgetting to turn appliances off, I found one that would turn itself off after a reasonable amount of time. I had to bring the first one of these back to the store because it kept turning off when I was ironing. I do think that is when my children heard me use language for which I am not particularly proud. Some years and three or four appliances later I bought the Cadillac of irons, a Rowenta, often touted by seamstresses as the sina qua non of ironing. For those of you who don’t sew, a good iron is as important as your sewing machine. I sought out the pricey domestic device because my adolescent daughter had asked me to make her senior prom gown.
Being asked to make this dress was such heady wine that I not only bought a new iron, but a new sewing machine. I bought a Rolls Royce, a Bernina. After spending an embarrassing amount of money on fabric that could have been made into a wedding gown, I took three months to construct this garment. It was, if I do say so myself, lovely. If I added up what it cost for the iron, the sewing machine and the dress, not even counting the time it took, I could have flown to New York, shopped at Bloomies and gotten a stunning something from the couture collection.
But like that steam iron so long ago, it was the context that made the experience so valuable. I wanted to make my daughter happy, proud even. I wanted to send her out on that night confident in herself, and like the sense of accomplishment that I get when the linens from Christmas dinner are clean, ironed and stacked for me to appreciate my continuing ironing skills, there is the sense of a beginning and an end, of success. So OK, there was a lot of money involved here, but I am willing to overlook that if you are.
I add one more thing. The Spanish verb planchar means to iron. It also means to smooth…so, ironing is smoothing not only the fabric, but for me, the wrinkles that accumulate in my life and so in some sense it is more than smoothing, in some sense it is soothing, an inexpensive psychotherapy that leaves me with nicely ironed napkins and clothing. Remember I said, “in some sense” so no marching to my door waving broomsticks, pitchforks, irons and wrinkle free garments….
