Laundry & String Theory

I really wanted to graduate from high school in Colorado and find myself strolling toward my first college class at Arizona State. WHY I was in such a rush to leave Denver -  I cannot tell you. I was advised I would not be attending ASU by the folks picking up the tab for that freshman year of classes, books and dorm room. I eventually selected Colorado State University - not because, at 18, I felt called to a particular vocation, but for the far more pivotal fact that my boyfriend was already there. How anyone under 25 truly "knows" what they should be working toward for the rest of their lives has always baffled me, especially because so many young people have not yet tackled the basics - like cooking, laundry and string theory.
I witnessed many young folks consuming copious pizza pies on Saturday night and then Sunday afternoon puzzling over both the washer and their load selections, opting to save some coin and just toss all dirties and unmentionables in the wash together. What was submerged as jeans, a crisp white Polo sweater  and a silky somthin somthin from that "new" store Victoria's Secret emerged as jeans, an indigo matted felt pullover scarcely big enough to cover a toddler and the matching indigo silky diaper cover sized panty. The deconstructed felt sweaterlet still sporting the essential yet ostentatious $75 Polo horse detail on the tiny little chest.
I don't recall these events as the subconscious push that turned my major from Philosophy to Textiles, but what the heck, let's simply call it what is. Kismet.
If I wondered what I was going to do with a Philosophy degree, I should have really become unnerved at the prospect of finding a way to support myself incorporating the "string theory" I learned in textile chemistry. So while you may ponder what string theory is and whether you can ever really grasp this cutting edge new science, you can relax while getting up close and personal with your laundry circumstance. There are coin flips to be studied (before they're sacrificed to the silver sliding coin pusher) and there is counting of the distinguishable and indistinguishable objects. A clear, yet sad example of this being the aforementioned "group wash debacle".  Two major  elements of physics at work in the  laundry room are electricity and magnetism, and I think we all know how those two crazies work together to infuse your fleece with a charge  - ultimately sending a shock down to your heals that just makes you mad. They conspire together in the dryer to abscond with one of your socks.
Trial and some expensive errors can be one of the most effective teachers there are. One time during my college days, I begged my boyfriend to lend me his NEW, super cool, black and white, new, striped sailor sweater - the one he had just bought. Wanting to return it freshly laundered, I trod out to the laundry room, carefully inserting the new, super cool garment into the wash with the appropriate suds mates, I selected the appropriate delicate cycle, some mild Woolite and off I went.  Apparently an errant troublesome red item was hidden in the jumble somehow and bled all over the sweater, lending a distinctive pink tint to the whole of it.
I. Was. Mortified.
WHO could have let this happen - this... heinous occurrence? Well, looking back, the accidental pinking should have been a sign that the relationship was tainted as well. Look and See -  even your laundry is a "sign".

Girls who love to wear pink

I graduated with a flourish and moved ahead with my life. These days  I have two daughters who delight in wearing pink!  I have used my Textiles degree to artfully arrange store front windows in South Beach, merchandise clothing for in-store displays and set up a booth for Reebok at the Miami Superbowl. Today, however, I utilize my degree to maintain all textiles residing in our home -from loads of left socks to bedroom linens. In other words, I'm a Mom who does laundry. The string theory I speak to involves only my families threads and to that end, I will work to keep us fresh and tightly bound.