8:10 a.m.: Sleep. Button.
8:20 a.m.: Slee ... Off.
9:19 a.m.: Shit. Lecture in eleven minutes.
9:20 a.m.: Weather.com: 45 degrees, Feels Like 31 degrees. Must dress warmly.
9:21 a.m.: Stand in front of dresser, heaving open all drawers that still have something in them. Scavenge wardrobe options.
9:22 a.m.: Outfit concocted from series of questionable substitutions:
Underwear: bikini bottom. Socks: 100 percent wool hiking socks, circa Outdoor Action freshman year. When folded, span the length/circumference of own thigh. Do not want to think about sock size when unfolded. Shirt: middle school production of Midsummer Night's Dream. Shrank last time was washed, has mysterious hole forming below left armpit. Pants: bottom half of forgotten warm-up suit. Bright green. Seemingly made out of parachute material.
Bra: no comment.
Shoes: Uggs. No laces, less time to put on. Also, green pants are six inches too long; may attempt to stuff excess parachute material into boots.
9:26 a.m.: Realize it is raining outside. Why. Why do I live in Forbes.
9:27 a.m.: Stub toe. Blinding pain. Must rest briefly.
9:28 a.m.: Catch glimpse of self in mirror while walking out door. Debate pros and cons of attending lecture looking like Marvin the Martian. Settle on lecture. Will build character.
I'm an uneasy procrastinator at best; but concerning laundry, I elude, shirk and sidestep with furious conviction. I pound clothes into my laundry sack like Revolutionary War soldiers packed gunpowder into their muskets. Both require brute force and the fervent hope that nothing will explode. As the weeks pass, my laundry sack swells to three times its size, slumped in the corner like an engorged tick. It calls to me, writhing wickedly next to my shoe rack, whispering in a voice not unlike Stewie from "Family Guy": "Scrub me. Bathe me. Launder my soiled remains, you hag."
I turn a blind eye to its biddings for another week, wandering around campus in laundry limbo, hovering on the brink of walking around nude. I don't care. No clothes hamper tells me what to do. I have opposable thumbs and fine motor skills. I dress myself. I decide when I'm naked and when I'm not. I am the boss of you, hamper.
But as the clothes continue to dwindle, rational argument falters. Show me the man who can confidently justify attending not one, but two lectures dressed in parachute pants. My last pair of clean OA socks in hand, I contemplate the relative difficulties of washing old socks and fashioning new socks out of Kleenex. One requires willpower; the other, ingenuity. And tissues. And probably some tape.
I begin devising incentives for myself. Past inducements were ineffective: new Downy detergent, team laundering with my roommate, a brief phase during which I considered awarding myself gold stars. All these proved lacking. But if I do my laundry today, I will buy myself Reese's afterwards. A mother-load King Size pack.
Upon reconsideration, I buy the candy immediately. My plan: Ride the sugar rush straight to the laundry room. Sitting across the room from my morbidly obese laundry sack, I eat my chocolates, one by one. The hamper broods stiffly in the corner, sausage-like. We eye each other warily. I break our gaze to look at my watch. Time to go to dinner and do other very important things. No time for laundry now. I head for the door, pulling on a long coat to hide my pajama pants and Tickle Me Elmo T-shirt. One must prioritize one's life.
Lying in bed the following Sunday morning, I paw at my alarm clock. Slowly, I realize there's a post-it note clinging to the sleep button. Scrawled in jittery all-caps, it appears I have addressed a message to my early-morning self: PLEASE, DO YOUR LAUNDRY. PLEASE.
Desperation has won out; the battle day has dawned.
I roll out of bed. Feigning disinterest toward the hamper, I steal a furtive glance. It lies behind me, languishing bulkily in the corner. I sense its lapse in attention. Fool. It suspects nothing. I pivot and take the sack at a run, straining to lift its lifeless form. Within seconds, my toddler-sized biceps are taxed of their strength. I drop the sack, jabbing it through the door with my foot. The carpeted hallway introduces heavy friction, eliminating all ground mobility. I consider partitioning the load: Reduce pounds-per-trip and increase net number of return missions. But leaving a rogue hamper unattended in a public thoroughfare is too risky. This sack is overweight and restive, potentially violent. Civilian lives are at risk. It's go big or go home.
Gathering my strength, I sling the hamper across my back and break into a squat-sprint. Legs wide and low to the ground, I clear hallways; brunch-goers jump aside and windowpanes shudder as I thunder past. Watching the endless hallways of Forbes rushing under my feet, I suddenly grasp why Reese's alone cannot stir me to action. Material inducement is mere bribery; superhuman feats such as laundry require an alter ego.
Make way, I think. I am the Ponderous Laundress, and my load is weighty. Be ye warned. I stop for no man.
Becca Foresman is a sophomore from San Diego, Calif. She can be reached at foresman@princeton.edu.
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