I was never fond of ironing. For one I could never pronounce the word properly. I would say “I-ron”, just like how it’s written and people would laugh at me. Finally a certain someone taught me a lovely trick. Apparently you’re supposed to say it like “I-earn” but faster. I still don’t get it but whatever. I tried telling a joke to a bunch of Americans that incorporated being tortured with an iron at some point… And I blanked for a second… I was literally like “what’s that thing you iron clothes with?” … I legitimately thought there was a special name for the device that irons your clothes. Needless to say they all looked at me like I was bat shit crazy. It’s alright though, had a good laugh at my Russianness and moved past it. Now let’s talk about the pros and cons of the actual act of ironing that once again I was never fond of until about 17 minutes ago.
Much like when being asked the question “Do you want the good or the bad news first?” we respond with “Bad please” more often than not because we want to finish on a good note, I’m going to do the same here and start with the cons.
THE CONS:
1. WRINKLES – Here you are standing over your big ironing board or crouching over your tiny little baby board because you either don’t have the space to store it or generally just don’t like big things.. And you’re going over that same wrinkle again and again with your iron but it just won’t go away. No matter how much water you put in that iron, no matter how many times you press the steam button or try to spray it before applying the heat, no matter how many times you read the caring instruction on that label to make sure you’re doing the right thing… Those stubborn wrinkles just won’t go away. So you’re standing there slaving away, wasting precious minutes that you could be spending on eating pizza or watching Breaking Bad for the 15th time or both, on a wrinkle that is so stubborn that quite frankly is there to stay regardless of your efforts.
2. MORE WRINKLES – God forbid you go too fast on the top layer when the bottom layer of your shirt is just chilling there underneath. Forget it! The bottom layer gets it and it never even sees it coming. That wrinkle is the most evil of wrinkles and it’s evil solely because it is the spawn of your own and you’re evil for having started ironing in the first place! Patience is a virtue they say. Had you been patient and slow, perhaps you could have avoided the creation of this evil wrinkle. But no no, you were not patient. You tried to get through ironing via fast route. And now you’re stuck with the ultimate wrinkle that is cursed and is incapable of being unwrinkled, ever, congratulations.
3. TIME – Oh my god the time… The time that it takes to iron is just so “Holy moly, the shit that I could be doing right now instead” kind of time. Think about it – you never iron just one thing. If you were to iron just one thing, that would mean that after you finished your laundry (and didn’t iron and hang everything) you just shoved everything in your closet and was like “Oh well, it’s wrinkled and shitty looking, I’ll worry about it when I get there”. That almost sounds reasonable, but wait…. If you’re THAT person, then chances are when it is in fact time, to worry about it “when you get there”, you don’t have the physical time to worry about it because you’re already running late. So now you’re stuck with the debacle of “Here’s the shirt I was hoping to wear to this thing but it’s not ironed and I don’t really have the time to do this right now” and “I’m just going to pick something else” which creates a whole other debacle which I’m not going to get into right now. Naturally, unfortunately so, the latter wins and you never end up ironing the Gosh Darn thing in the first place. So it just hangs there… wrinkled and unloved.. Eventually old and donated… what does that say about the society and overall negligence of the 21st century?
4. HIT THE FLOOR – Apple bottom jeans.. Boots with the fur.. The whole club was looking at her.. She hit the floor.. NOPE! She did not hit the floor. Your sheets hit the floor. That’s right, your clean, fresh out of the laundry sheets hit the floor when/if you were attempting to iron them simply because they’re too large to stretch over your ironing board and not hit the floor. Now here’s the thing, if you’re ironing your sheets, then you’re probably keeping your floors clean too. No one that lives in a messy home would ever even consider ironing their sheets. One just goes with the other. I mean, it’s not like you have inches of dust bunnies and bread crumbs on your floor and then all of a sudden you decide to iron your sheets.. Even so, “sheets hitting the floor” thing is kind of icky to me. Even the 5 second rule never sat well with me. You walk on the floor… with your feet. It can’t possibly be clean. So when you take the sheets out of the dryer they should “fly” from there to the bed, not be dragged through the sweaty sock stained, loose hair covered floors. Of course if they do in fact “fly”, they won’t be ironed, but these are the choices we have to make.
5. TOOLS – Get a good iron! Newsflash – Most of the things that are sold at Walmart are not of good quality. You can’t expect to buy a shitty iron and have it get rid of all of the unwanted wrinkles as if by magic. In my way too long of experience with ironing, due to work related scenarios or otherwise, I’ve noticed that just like with anything else in life you should not waste money on cheap things because… I cannot put it in simpler terms – It will not get you the results that you want. Get good tools to get things done GOOD. Period.
Now that we’ve gotten the bad stuff out the way, let’s shift focus to the good stuff.
THE PROS:
1. JUSTIFICATION – We all have our addictions. Some are justifiable and some aren’t so much. Let’s take Netflix for example. It’s hard to justify coming home from work and plopping your ass on the couch with Netflix to keep you company just because you’re tired. Boo hoo, we’re all tired! But if you combine Netflix with something useful like ironing for example it’s a whole different story. Now you can watch several episodes of Everybody Loves Raymond reruns and not feel guilty because instead of just wasting time, you did something of value.
2. MORE JUSTIFICATION – Not only can you justify your time being allocated appropriately but by ironing you can also justify the existence of The Iron and the Ironing Board in your household in the first place. Let’s face it, we all go through the list of things we need when we move to a new place.. Among the tea kettle, the toaster and the microwave, the iron and the ironing board tend to sneak their way in even if we don’t intend on using them all that much. Well, by ironing your stuff once in a while you’re actually doing no other than justifying your original domestic somewhat impulsive intentions!
3. DOMESTICATION – There’s something about ironing that gives you that warm feeling that can’t be described in any way other than “HOME”. It’s a shame that we live a world surrounded by feminists and “politically incorrect” debacles to see that a woman is at her best when she is in her natural state – the “caring for her family” state. There’s nothing like the satisfaction of feeding someone. There’s nothing like the satisfaction of knowing that the one or ones you care about are sheltered and fed. There’s nothing like the satisfaction of realizing that you are the wall behind the comfort of your loved ones, even in its smallest of forms. There’s something about ironing, as simple of an act as it may be, that makes the whole thing seem more important somehow. It’s not just you moving an ironing tool over a white cotton shirt back and forth; it’s you making sure that whoever wears the shirt is comfortable and looks damn good! Even if it is you yourself…
4. SATISFACTION – Seriously, it is the most satisfying feeling ever next to maybe like real orgasms to lie on/under ironed sheets. It’s almost insane that one might never experience the majestic feeling of ironed sheets as long as they hold on to the “It’s just sheets” concept. The creases on your pillowcases that you think are irrelevant when ironed completely disappear and you sleep like a baby in a womb. The sheets that are covering you, with the wrinkles gone are a whole new set of sheets ready to coddle you into a world of warmth and acceptance.
5. DRINKING –Ladies and gentlemen, let’s not forget.. Any act you perform which demands any sort of agony from you such as boredom for example, can be fixed with alcohol. So you’re in a position where you absolutely have to iron work shirts for work the next day? No big deal. Combine ironing with bourbon and you’re good. As long as you don’t end up “Bourning” your clothes that is.
So there you have it. Much like everything else in life, the act of ironing contains all kinds of angles, good bad and ugly that is. Bottom line is how you look at it.
