Week 3: Laundry

So this week was pretty hectic and long, even though it was just four days. I stayed home this weekend, it was my first weekend in Austin. Not going to lie, it was pretty boring because most of my friends went back home. Saturday night was pretty fun because I went to the first event for one of the organizations I am in, Muslim Student Association, but I will talk more about that in another post. Sunday was SO boring, I literally stayed in my room with my roommate. Honestly, I was so stressed out with all the work that I had that I was just feeling really blue and lazy. I just went out to eat. I have this annoying urge to always do something productive, and not stay still, so even though I was extremely tired, I decided to do some work. The task that I chose to do was laundry. I know it seems pretty lame that I find doing laundry something worth writing a post about, but for me it was something I had never done on my own before and I had to learn on the job. No, I did not use Google or call my mom for help, I really wanted to do it myself. Doing your own laundry is a part of "adulting," so I knew I had to do it sooner or later. I was running out of clean clothes, so I decided to experience another part of college life and being independent. My roommate and I went to our laundry room, which is downstairs in our residence hall, and we had such a hard time finding an open washing machine because there were so many people in there. Pro tip - don't do laundry Sunday night! After we finally found the machines, the confusion began. I knew that I had to put detergent, but I only had Tide-pods, and of course we weren't allowed to put those in the side-tray. It was so awkward because we were just looking around, and we eventually had to build up the courage to ask someone for detergent. She was so sweet, and told us to use however much we wanted. Another thing about Austin is that everyone is really helpful and nice, probably because we are all in the same boat. Anyways, so after my roommate and I put our load in, we went back to our room until it was time to put our clothes into the dryer. We went back down after 30 minutes, and of course, even more people were in the laundry room. Finding an empty dryer was even more difficult because there was no "window" to see through, so I was carefully opening all the dryers that did not have timers on them, and the amount of random clothes that fell out was quite amusing. Not going to lie, there are some people more confused that I was, so that was comforting because I didn't feel completely incompetent or hopeless. Another tip - make sure you know which machine you are using, so you are not frantically searching for your stuff (yes this actually happens). However, after I got my clothes (they were so warm and cozy, it was incredible), I actually felt a little more organized (I rearranged my drawers) and more accomplished (even though it was a basic task). I feel like something so small made me happy because I actually did it on my own, and felt like an independent person in charge of her own life. Later that night, I called my parents and told them about my experience, and of course they told me there was a simpler way of doing it - I could've just put my Tide-pods in the washing machine with my clothes. I thought that would mess my clothes up but apparently not, but don't worry I will do it next time! College is tough, so the small joys really count :). Oh, another benefit of living in a dorm is that laundry is free - I didn't know that when I came here, so I took coins because that what I've seen on TV (but of course not everything we see is true). Anyways my first experience with doing laundry was pretty good, it wasn't as confusing/problematic as I thought. It was honestly so satisfying therapeutic. I'm not the most organized person, but I felt like I kind of had a small part of my life together afterwards - it was great.