Ahhh that feel of smooth, soft, crisp, pressed sheets, that are fitted so tightly around the bed. They smell of the wind that has invisibly come to move them back and forth as they hang to dry. My hands run along each sheet, each pillowcase after it is ironed and then they are folded and fitted together ready to be placed in the drawer awaiting their next use.
Ironing is a task that is not very common, in fact recently someone spoke of how it was a waste of time and energy. Very few freshly made beds are prepared with those sheets that have been hung to dry and then folded and ironed. Most people don’t even seem to notice.
As a little girl I used to watch my Grandma feed the bleached white sheets through the wringer washer and then put them into the wicker basket. We would carry it up the concrete stairs, open the slanted dark green wooden doors where we would find the clothes line, and place the basket on the lawn. The wheels on the line would squeal as the weight of the sheets was tossed over them. The damp cotton felt cool to my little hands even on a very hot day. My reach was far too limited to stretch those beautiful white panels out but it could touch the bottom hem as they rested upon the line that stretched from the back of the house through the garden to the garage. I could stand between them and be enveloped in that beautiful clean scent of laundry and look up into the blue sky to feel the warm sun on my face. I could hear them snap in the wind as it picked up its pace. Then at night I would climb into bed, bathed and fresh and clean, and let the cool crisp sheets be pulled up over me. I would inhale the scent, lay my hands upon the wrinkle free cloth and listen to the cicadas sing on those summer nights at my Grandparents home.
Ironing sheets today are part of a ritual in some of my daily tasks. There are 17 beds to change at Linwood House and at times my shoulders ache as I strip and then remake each bed. But my hands still love the feel of those clean sheets and somehow making up a bed with those pressed fresh sheets is a way for me to place love within that room. Sounds crazy? Maybe it is. But someone will soon come to rest in that place and their body will seek sleep and their mind may not be in tune with that. Can the unseen love that prepared this place for them to rest be felt by them? Will they know I wanted them to rest well - body, soul and spirit?
As a young woman part of my role in a family of six children, I being the eldest followed by 5 boys, was to share with my mother the weekly ironing the 37 shirts and the sheets of the 7 beds in the house. Standing there, spreading my hands over the sheets or shirts to smooth them, then applying the hot iron and listening to the hiss of the steam and inhaling the particular scent, I used to have all sorts of conversations with people who would never hear my voice or even see me. Later on this time of standing became a place to have a one way dialogue with God who I could not see and most of the time felt was not even listening to me. But I could say what I thought! Maybe standing and ironing even became the birthplace of honest conversations with the Almighty. To this day it continues to be a space of standing to speak with Them.
Clothes lines in Australia, Scotland, Ireland, Italy, have been places I have stood, shaken out the fabric and hung it over the line. In Italy we used to hang out the sheets in the rain from the balcony, and then place plastic over the lines, leaving them there for several days before bringing them in to iron them. I have loved those moments in other places where I could stretch out those clean sheets and let them waft in the breeze to dry. The wind may carry a different scent but it feels the same no matter where you go.
Today I ironed, stretched, and moved the fabric to pull out the creases, and applied the heat of the iron to newly washed sheets. A hint of lavender spray was added for a touch of scent that relaxes the mind. My hands delighted in running over their smoothness.
This is a continuing ritual for me at the end of the day when one lays their body between the sheets, lifts their feet into the bed, lets themselves be covered with this fabric that is a multitude of threads entwined, and at last lets the mind, body and soul rest and fall into sleep that restores and nourishes.
Have we become so hurried that rituals we hold dear rob us of moments that call our senses into a place of pure delight in something so ordinary and so simple? It may not be ironing, but for me this task holds memories of time, of delight, of people who are gone from this earth that nurtured me by taking time to patiently teach me these tasks. It is a reminder that even getting into bed can be a sacred moment in a day.
And…maybe I am crazy but I still love the feel, the scent, and the look of those beautiful smooth sheets on the bed waiting for someone to get in and rest there.
