991st Post - Stupid Things Bevboy Has Done, Part Four

Welcome to the fourth installment of my irregularly-published feature on Bevboy's Blog: Stupid Things Bevboy Has Done, or STBHD for short. This series is all about dumb things I have done over the many years of my life, or the dumb things I have had done to me. The net result is my feeling, well, stupid.

This time, I want to discuss a stupid event from my early adulthood. I had just moved out of my parents' home and forged my own life in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. I was living at 55 Dahlia Street, Apt. 208. My phone number back then was (902) 466-4755. I wonder who has that number now? Why don't you call and find out?

Anyway, I had become independant but there were still apron strings attached. Lonely and hating my job and not being used to the city, I'd go home every weekend. Lazy and incompetent, I'd have my mother do my laundry for me. I think every young man who's just moved out gets his mother to wash his clothes for a bit after he moves out.

I'd carry home the week's worth of clothes in a garbage bag, and return them in the same garbage bag. My parents bought the same brand name of bags for their own use. This was before you had to recycle everything.

I justified my mother doing all this work by the fact that I was busy during the week, working at this crappy, underpaying but overdemanding job. At night, the building's one washing machine and one dryer were often in use, and I'd have a hard time finding a time when one or both of them were available.

I kept my garbage bag full of clothes in the kitchen by the wood stove. My parents' garbage bag, with actual garbage in it, was always nearby.

My father enjoyed eating prunes back then. It was one of his favourite snacks. The pits, of course, are inedible. Dad would spit them out into the woodstove, or place them in the garbage bag.

One Sunday night, I returned to the city with my bag full of clean clothes to wear that week. I upended the bag and placed the contents on my bed, in preparation of arranging them into piles of socks, undies, pants, and so on. You know: So I could put them away.

There were sticky, hard things attached to some of the clothes. Upon closer examination, I discovered that my father had confused the two garbage bags. Rather than put those pits in their bag, he had spat them into mine. My dirty clothes, cleaned by my mother, had become dirty again.

Yeah. I know. I felt pretty stupid.

To this day, I don't know if this was a subliminal way to get me to stop taking my dirty clothes home every weekend, or an honest mistake on his part. He would not remember this small event after so long. But I remember it, and I am sharing it with you now because I learned from this. I never took my clothes home again. I found a way to find the time to wash them during the week, fending more and more for myself, like I should have all along anyway. Some lessons are hard learned and not appreciated at the time. This was one of them.

Next time: A science experiment that went wrong.