The Laundromat

As we move through our lives, we have a tendency to forget just how lucky we are.  For the past 10 years, I've been lucky enough to have my own washer and dryer, never having to venture outside of my comfortable home to wash my dirty laundry.

Being here changes that.  Each weekend consists of doing laundry in a laundromat.  I found one close to the hotel and have used it twice now.  The place isn't exactly "clean," but it's easy to get to.  Yesterday, I went with a fellow nurse in my platoon and we had quite an experience.

After my wash cycle was done, I tumbled all of my clothes into one of the laundry carts and brought it over to an empty dryer.  Inside the dryer was a handful of dryer sheets.  I figured someone had left them in there, so I grabbed them, threw them out, and started up my drying cycle.  Less than 5 minutes later, a very loud, neon-blue-braided woman wearing a tank top and pajama bottoms starts yelling.  She was standing in front of the dryer, asking whose clothes were in there.  When I admitted they were mine, she directed her tirade at me; "I had 4 Bounce sheets in there.  You need to get your clothes out of there and let me have my Bounce sheets!  When you see dryer sheets in the dryer, that means the dryer is taken!"  I offered to buy her some more dryer sheets so that she could use a different dryer.  She wasn't interested in that and kept yelling at me.  I was thinking, "Crap!  We haven't learned combatives yet!"  (-:  Finally, I said, "You can't use a different dryer?"  I think that made something click in her head and she finally understood just how ridiculous she was being.

There must be some unspoken rule of engagement in the laundromat because this woman proceeded to befriend me, telling me she's from Louisiana and had to relocate to San Antonio because of Hurricane Katrina.  She told me she had been cleaning houses for the past 19 years.  She has 3 daughters who live in Houston and Dallas.  She can cook "anything."  She loves Cajun cooking.  And on and on!  She hugged me at the end of her time in the laundromat and said, "God Bless!"  She said that it was really great that I was a nurse in the Army (she had seen my uniform swirling around in the dryer).

After all of that excitement, I went to the post gym and swam a half mile.  That felt really good.

The rest of the night was downtime, which I needed quite a bit.  Jorge and I booked a flight for him to come visit.  He's arriving on Thursday evening and going back to WI on Sunday.  I cannot wait to see him!

I just heard that I'm moving on post today.  Better get all of my stuff packed-up and ready to go.

Have a great day!