Joseph Natividad

Doing the Laundry on My Own

Home-cooked meals and freshly done laundry are no longer things I take for granted. For the past two and a half weeks here in La Jolla, I have been relying on cafeteria food and a playing a guessing game between the laundry detergent and myself.

What exactly is a ? cup? The no-name laundry detergent my parents had bought me before they left for the Bay Area had no measuring cup so I had to pour it into the machine based on instinct.

I washed all whites earlier this week and it didn?t turn out too badly. I plan on doing all the colors later today and hope for a similar outcome.

When I was at home I never had to do my own laundry. My dad was in charge of that household chore. I was responsible for watering my mom?s plants in the front and backyard, washing the dishes, vacuuming the entire house, and occasionally taking out the garbage.

As for my room, I cleaned it whenever I felt it was too messy to sleep in.

When the time to leave home neared, I began to panic because I had never done the laundry on my own before. The not-so-pleasant image of my white shirts turning a pale orange because I had neglected to notice a red sock in my wash load had crossed my mindwhile I waited for my clothes to finish soaking.

The first time I washed my clothes here, the washing and drying machines near my dorm were glitching so a few of them would allow me to do my laundry without putting some quarters in. Today I’m hoping that the school’s maintenance crew hasn’t figured it out so I don’t have to scour my room for a bunch of quarters that I doubt to exist.

Tags: cafeteria_food, chores, drying_machines, home_cooked_meals, laundry_detergent, la_jolla, ucsd