As a little girl I noticed that the other girls' mothers (yes I thought like that then) had clotheslines with a handle to wind the line up and down. I was convinced that our standard fixed height line was a sign of social inferiority and was somewhat ashamed of it.
Imagine the delight more than 40 years later arriving in Australia and finding that the Uniting Church provided a home complete with a Hills Hoist clothesline. Winding the handle up and down each week always prompts reflection on those long ago days.
Until the handle jammed. With the clothesline at its highest point. Hanging laundry is now a bit of a gym workout: squat by basket, lift out garment, step up, peg, peg, step down squat by basket ...
As Mothers' Day approaches I remember how privileged our childhood was, with an abundance of good things. The fixed height line was not the result of deprivation or disadvantage. Probably, more like Helen Mirren playing her majesty in the Queen's LandRover, there was a sense of not replacing functional items just because a newer version is available.
And some practical common sense that the more complicated a piece of equipment, the greater the chance of malfunction. They missed the gym workout though.
1 comment:
It's funny to think of a clothesline like that--I've always had ones fixed in place with wooden poles!
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