U.S. Residents Fight For The Right To Hang Laundry

[Xicano]

PERKASIE, Pennsylvania (Reuters) – Carin Froehlich pegs her laundry to three clotheslines strung between trees outside her 18th-century farmhouse, knowing that her actions annoy local officials who have asked her to stop.

Froehlich is among the growing number of people across America fighting for the right to dry their laundry outside against a rising tide of housing associations who oppose the practice despite its energy-saving green appeal.

Although there are no formal laws in this southeast Pennsylvania town against drying laundry outside, a town official called Froehlich to ask her to stop drying clothes in the sun. And she received two anonymous notes from neighbors saying they did not want to see her underwear flapping about.

"They said it made the place look like trailer trash," she said, in her yard across the street from a row of neat, suburban houses. "They said they didn't want to look at my 'unmentionables.'"


http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20091118/us_nm/us_usa_laundry

[Obamanaut]

1. Several years ago we had a stacked washer/dryer combo (dryer

on top of washer.) I was never satisfied with the dryer because it took so long to dry.

I told Miz O that I would do all the laundry, and hang it out, if she would let me get rid of the set.

The NEXT day, there was a new washer on the back of the truck for me to unload, a buyer for the combo had been found, and I've been washing and hanging ever since.

I'm more careful of what I ask for now.

We live in a rural area, so we don't have the problems of those folks with a housing association.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

40. And your clothes probably last longer too, I reckon.

Having lived in the UK for four years, where almost nobody has a dryer, I found that I was able to make t-shirts last many, many years if I put them out on a line. Since moving back to the states and doing everything in a dryer most of these items of clothing have disintegrated.

[grilled onions]

2. When Did A Clothes Line Become Bad News?

It's free. Gives a person a little exercise as well as fresh air. You never heard of objections to long johns airing in the breeze 80 years ago when society was more strict on such things. It doesn't harm anything. Yet we live in this Monopoly board world where clothes,clotheslines,dog houses--even fences have become banned from neighborhoods. Oddly enough portable basketball hoops seem to be ok as do yards full of bikes,toys that never seem to get picked up for days or weeks at a time. Will we see a day when "clothing optional" means a person can hang out laundry in public view????

[malaise]

3. WTF????????????????

We rarely use a dryer and see it as part of energy saving.

[madrchsod]

4. the only problems i see...

she`s not properly hanging up her laundry, her line is`t tight enough,and she`ll need a pole.

carin-proudly display your undies between those american flags!

[spinbaby]

5. That's her problem--she's not doing it right

You don't just put up some sagging bit of line between two trees in the front yard, you set up a dedicated clothesline out back.

[Le Taz Hot]

6. Is it her property?

If so, how is it ANYONE'S business? What if she doesn't have trees in her back yard? What if she doesn't have the money to afford a formal clothesline? What if she doesn't own a dryer and can't afford one? Look at the neighborhood. I'm sorry, this doesn't look like one of those disgusting "gated communities" where the Homeowner Association's Gestapo come around and DEMAND that your bathroom be painted EXACTLY the "correct" shade of mauve, or else! We're SUPPOSED to be leaving less carbon footprint and I'd say she's doing just that.

[spinbaby]

11. If my neighbor is a slob, it's my business

Back in the days when everyone dried their laundry on a line (and I AM old enough to remember this), it was well understood that there was place for a clothesline and that place was not in the front yard. I have a clothesline, I love my clothesline, but I wouldn't dream of putting that saggy thing in my front yard.

[Le Taz Hot]

12. So, your answer to ALL of those questions is

essentially, "This is the way *I* do it and everyone else should do it exactly the same way." Mkay. :eyes:

[spinbaby]

25. No, but I believe in being civil

And in having some consideration for my neighbors. Apparently you feel that you should be able to do any damn thing you please.

[Le Taz Hot]

26. When those neighbors start paying my mortgage,

THEN they can dictate what I can and cannot do on my own property.

[bigtree]

30. even worse

. . . we PAY hundreds (some over a thou) in association fees for them to dictate this to us.

[Le Taz Hot]

32. Who's "us?"

:hide: :evilgrin: I was fortunate enough to be poor enough to buy into an old, working class neighborhood. The clotheslines came with the houses. ;-)

[bigtree]

35. 'us' is the increasing numbers of folks subject to these neighborhood associations

[Xithras]

42. People used to have other ways of dealing with problems like this.

When I was a kid, everyone had clotheslines in their backyard, and putting up a line in your front yard was considered tacky and "redneck". If someone did it anyway, they'd usually come out to find their lines cut one morning. After replacing the line a few times, they'd usually take the hint and move it to their backyard.

No lawsuits, fines, or HOA enforcement actions needed, and clothesline is cheap.

[Libertas1776]

7. I would never move into a place

that was run by the dictates of some stupid home owners association and their bullshit rules and regulations. If I want to hang my laundry, I am going to hang my laundry and if you got a problem, you can go take a hike.

[treestar]

8. Clothes line snobbery

Probably created by the advent of dryers in the 50s or whenever - your lack of clothesline showed off that you owned one. Then keeping up with the Joneses, you had to have a dryer to prove you were as good a little consumer as everyone else.

Now, who cares? Amazing how that kind of snobbery hangs on.

[GoCubsGo]

9. This is why I will never live in a neighborhood that's run by an HA.

It stuns me that people get the vapors over the sight of underwear. The poor, frail things...

Doonesbury did a strip on this very subject several years ago:
http://www.californiasolarcenter.org/solardryer.html

[jberryhill]

10. Lethal Injection Is More Humane /nt

[Captain Hilts]

13. I MUCH prefer clothes dried without a dryer. This is an easy way to save energy. nt

[bigtree]

14. that's our neighborhood too

At least they allow a 'temporary' line where I live . . . we're practically the only ones who take advantage of it since my dryer died a year or so ago. It would seem that with the energy costs . . .

They also ban growing vegetables out front (but we grow tomatoes in defiance - call them vegetables, willya!)

[Captain Hilts]

15. Why is she hanging her laundry in the front yard? That's kind of weird. nt

[-..__...]

24. Maybe because the front gets the most sun.

Doesn't matter though... even if she wanted to place two large poles and a line on her roof and hang her laundry there it's nobodys business.

[Odin2005]

16. The anti-clothes-line snobs can go STFU.

[TwilightGardener]

17. If that's her front yard, I can sorta see why people might complain--

but there shouldn't be a problem with a back or side-yard line. I used to have a clothesline behind my first house, would hang my quilts and sheets out there.

[pipi_k]

18. All sorts of excuses and justifications....

for hanging "laundry" in what appears to be her front yard:


maybe she doesn't have trees in the back

maybe she can't afford a regular pole line for the back



She doesn't appear to me to be hanging "laundry" (who washes mini American flags?) so much as trying to be an annoyance. It wouldn't bother me any if she wanted to hang her laundry in the back. If it's that much of an annoyance, perhaps her neighbors can all chip in to BUY her a pole line for the backyard.

Pretty fair compromise for everyone, I would imagine...

[bigtree]

19. maybe it's her side yard which has a view of the front

Those houses look pretty far away, not to mention partially blocked by bushes

[pipi_k]

38. could be...

but if the neighbors' houses are any indication, it looks like there's a rather sizable front yard that's going to be visible from the street and other homes.

Granted, it's likely not out on the front stoop, but it's not far enough back to be invisible to others...

:shrug:

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

41. How can you not afford two sticks and a piece of rope? n/t

[HippieCowgirl]

20. Hang your clothes outside - hang your underwear on a rack in the bathroom. problem solved.

[Subdivisions]

28. Hell no! Fly your BADs proudly! n/t

[we can do it]

29. That's What I Do- I Hate Having My Undies Fly Down the Street

[Mari333]

21. I would hang a huge sign on my clothesline along with my clothes

that says

"BITE ME YUPPIE FUCKERS"


I usemy clothesline all the time, for christs sake,its the way we did things when I was a kid..everyone used a clothesline back in the 50s.

[Le Taz Hot]

22. LOL!

:applause:

[formercia]

31. Until the Power Companies and Big Oil convinced everyone

that having electric and gas fired appliances was the 'Modern' thing to do.

I wonder if some of those anonymous notes came from the local utilities.

[Mari333]

34. It gave our mothers more time to drink gin until their husbands came home

[StarfarerBill]

23. I am sooooooo glad I rent...

...and don't have to put up with the asinine bullshit of neighborhood associations.

[Subdivisions]

27. Drying clothes in a dryer on a sunny day should be outlawed except in

situations where it is not practical like apartment complexes. And even then, I've seen many times where apartment complexes have facilitated the clotheslines on which to dry clothes. But those are mostly low-income and older places where where washer/dryer hook-ups are not available. Of course, you'd never find clotheslines in upscale suburban apartment complexes.

The energy savings from drying on the line would be enormous. I remember fondly the days when seeing clothes drying on the line was part of the American landscape. When did it go out of fashion?

[DU GrovelBot]

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[Rosa Luxemburg]

36. I think rotary driers are the best

they look neater and the wind blows them around so clothes get drier.

[havocmom]

37. Clean underware drying in sunshine is bad, but GOP dirty laundry is fine with many Americans?

Oh, gee, I wonder why America is on its downhill run...

Oooo, the latest racy Victoria Secret commercial is on the TV! NICE!

Ooooo lookie at the juicy gossip photos on the front of the tabloids at the check out!

Ooooo, those pics of Paris almost wearing that fancy gown are fabulous!




Underware: sometimes America is against it but we seem to like it when it is full of flesh.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

39. Wow, I was not aware...

...that Zurich, Milan, Paris, and London are full of trailer trash.

[The2ndWheel]

43. Hanging your own laundry doesn't create jobs

Doing anything for yourself doesn't create jobs. I'm still not sure why we don't have people to put your socks on your feet in the morning, and to put the toothpaste on the toothbrush, and then to open your mouth for you, another person to brush one tooth, then another person to brush another, etc. No, everybody is doing these things themselves. That doesn't stimulate the economy.