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boxoftheskyking:
Sometimes I look at my Facebook feed or my Tumblr dash and I think
“Damn. Some of yall separate your whites and colors
What’s that like?”
Tumblr ate this and wouldn’t let me reblog with it, but I typed this whole thing out, so I’m going to reply with it. I’ll tell you exactly what that’s like.
I separate my clothes by whether they’ll bleed vs whether they won’t, and then further subdivide that into what temperature I’ll wash them at and how much agitation. Less-durable clothing gets cold and less agitation. Clothes that won’t bleed get hotter water and longer agitation and sometimes a soak (my washer, 30 years old or so, is great for this because if you leave the lid up, it’ll fill and agitate, then sit and wait until you come and deal with it. So I come down and re-set it to the beginning, then close the lid; an extra agitation after a long soak does wonders to really get dirt out). Then I wash in an order so that the whites (since dude switched to black socks i rarely have a proper load of whites so it’s usually pale blues mostly) come after the darks (bc lint sometimes gets in the washer and it’s gross when your black t-shirts are coated in white mung) and so I’ll have two loads in a row containing things like socks and towels that need to go in the dryer or they’ll be stiff. Almost everything else gets hung up, but in the winter sometimes I’ll tumble things like t-shirts and Dude’s button-downs until damp, so that when I hang them they don’t have creases. He has a couple of nice shirts that really ought to be ironed, but he doesn’t iron and doesn’t care if he looks like an unmade bed, but I’ve found that if I half-tumble them they turn out acceptable so it doesn’t give me fits the whole time he’s walking around in them. I’m not going to iron them. I guess unless I’m ironing other things, which I only ever do for sewing projects. Which I guess I don’t really do anymore because I’d have to, you know, do them.)
I also like to wash darks first to hang them dry so I take them off the line promptly, and then whites go up and can stay up long after they’re dry to bleach in the sun.
I also can’t not do these things, can’t not think of them, and if I half-ass the process at any point, I get very despair-y and lose all motivation and do things like leave the clothes in the washer after they’re done so long that they smell off and i have to re-wash them and now they’ve bled on one another and I have blue tights with red streaks on them.
What’s it like? What’s it like? I think it’s probably like any other OCD-spectrum behavior. I wish it actually meant I was a Person who was Together, but I haven’t actually put my clothes away in several years. I dress out of piles– but by god, those clothes are Properly Clean.

boxoftheskyking:
Sometimes I look at my Facebook feed or my Tumblr dash and I think
“Damn. Some of yall separate your whites and colors
What’s that like?”
Tumblr ate this and wouldn’t let me reblog with it, but I typed this whole thing out, so I’m going to reply with it. I’ll tell you exactly what that’s like.
I separate my clothes by whether they’ll bleed vs whether they won’t, and then further subdivide that into what temperature I’ll wash them at and how much agitation. Less-durable clothing gets cold and less agitation. Clothes that won’t bleed get hotter water and longer agitation and sometimes a soak (my washer, 30 years old or so, is great for this because if you leave the lid up, it’ll fill and agitate, then sit and wait until you come and deal with it. So I come down and re-set it to the beginning, then close the lid; an extra agitation after a long soak does wonders to really get dirt out). Then I wash in an order so that the whites (since dude switched to black socks i rarely have a proper load of whites so it’s usually pale blues mostly) come after the darks (bc lint sometimes gets in the washer and it’s gross when your black t-shirts are coated in white mung) and so I’ll have two loads in a row containing things like socks and towels that need to go in the dryer or they’ll be stiff. Almost everything else gets hung up, but in the winter sometimes I’ll tumble things like t-shirts and Dude’s button-downs until damp, so that when I hang them they don’t have creases. He has a couple of nice shirts that really ought to be ironed, but he doesn’t iron and doesn’t care if he looks like an unmade bed, but I’ve found that if I half-tumble them they turn out acceptable so it doesn’t give me fits the whole time he’s walking around in them. I’m not going to iron them. I guess unless I’m ironing other things, which I only ever do for sewing projects. Which I guess I don’t really do anymore because I’d have to, you know, do them.)
I also like to wash darks first to hang them dry so I take them off the line promptly, and then whites go up and can stay up long after they’re dry to bleach in the sun.
I also can’t not do these things, can’t not think of them, and if I half-ass the process at any point, I get very despair-y and lose all motivation and do things like leave the clothes in the washer after they’re done so long that they smell off and i have to re-wash them and now they’ve bled on one another and I have blue tights with red streaks on them.
What’s it like? What’s it like? I think it’s probably like any other OCD-spectrum behavior. I wish it actually meant I was a Person who was Together, but I haven’t actually put my clothes away in several years. I dress out of piles– but by god, those clothes are Properly Clean.
