Ironing Day

Dear Diary,

I have been curating the exhibits at our local historical society for 16 years.  Each year I pick a theme to highlight in the exhibition.  This year it is about the village of South Hiram.  In this part of the display I took a written account by a local woman about learning to iron when she was a little girl.  Her neighbor taught her and they still used the flat irons heated on the wood stove.  She also spoke of the dread she felt the first time she ironed a man's starched white shirt.  She was terrified that she would scorch it and he only had two shirts!  I try to make the history personal whenever I can and this really resonated with me.

It got me thinking about those embroidered tea towels where each day of the week's chore was illustrated.  Monday was wash day and Tuesday was ironing day.  I still do my wash on Mondays but I don't do a lot of ironing.  I do confess, however, that I love to iron.  I use a lavender Scottish linen spray and it is actually a pleasure but maybe it is because I don't have to do it all that often.

I often think about how much easier daily life is now compared to our grandparents.  It is easy to take for granted all our modern conveniences.  Through these exhibits we can look back into the lives of our grandparents and great grandparents and I hope it gives us a new perspective through which we can regard our own lives and times.