I recently received the following comment on my DIY Dryer Maintenance post that read:
“Wow, a dryer ? It’s always interesting to see how other “cultures” do things, I have never even owned one, a dryer that is. The clothes hang out on the line, the sun does it’s thing.
No carbon pollution from burning electricity, no money spent on electricity, money saved in purchasing and money saved in repairs.
I DO appreciate the DIY approach though. good job :)”
At first I felt a little taken aback…almost defensive. But that feeling quickly shifted into gratefulness for the reality check (and the kind way with which it was given).
We have worked very hard to shift many of our habits away from the consumerist culture and towards the more environmentally friendly over the past few years, but there is still much work to be done. Using a washer and dryer for our clothes is one of those shifts that has not happened yet and probably won’t for the foreseeable future. We could pipe our grey water to cover some of our water costs and recycle in that way, but we don’t have enough non-edible landscaping for it to really make sense at this point. We could hang our clothes out to dry, but we live in a very dry climate and right next to a very busy street which equates to dusty, smelly clothes by the time they’ve dried (which wouldn’t take long, but the smell would not be OK).
This whole thing begs the question, though, of the conveniences so many of us live with that aren’t even options or on the radar of so many other people across this beautiful globe of ours. We are, here in the US, consumers. We define the word. And while we are making small changes to our daily lives, it often feels as though it is just not enough to affect enough change for it all to be worth it.
But it is worth it. Every small step is worth it. We just need to take so many more small (and giant) steps towards changing our habits so that we can leave this planet in better shape than our generation came into.
Have you thought about such things? Do you live in a consumerist culture and think about what you could be doing differently and how to implement those changes in your daily lives? What things would you change? Or, do you live in a place where habits like ours surprise you? Which habits surprise you the most?
Please share your thoughts in the comments below so we can learn from each other!
xoxo,
M
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I actually have a dryer but use it for towels and undies/socks. I have a shower tension rod in the doorway of my laundry area and I just hang shirts and pants on hangers right in the doorway. They’re dry by the next day. I have a folding clothes rack I use as well. I generally wait until I have a complete load of sock/underclothes and then wash all together and dry. I confess it’s sheer laziness on my part in doing this. I also dry towels because they’re softer. I put my bedding on the clothes line. I’m fortunate not to have to worry about road dust. You could probably cut back on some of your drying with a few minor changes, but I think it’s nice to have a dryer when the weather is nasty or you really have an urgent need to get the laundry done (like a little one in training pants which 🙂