Appliances and Poetry

Who knew buying an appliance could lead to reaffirmations of identity? April, the cruellest, the only quote anyone knows from “The Waste Land,” was a time of household crises, travel mishaps and excessive bleeding of the savings account. Now it’s May and the new washing machine arrived in the knick of time because our last clean knickers went into service this morning.

Installation was scheduled between 7 and 11 a.m. “Yeah, that’ll be at two,” I predicted, with my experience-based doubt of delivery service. The phone woke us at 6:15 with a terse, “we’ll be there in forty minutes.” Wait: what? We threw on clothes and watched two young men harness themselves into those strap contraptions that go over their shoulders and under the machine to take out our old Maytag, rocking it like a baby.

“How old is this?” one asked.

“Twenty-three,” I replied.

“That’s older than me,” he grinned.

The guy hoisting my new machine up the steps hadn’t been born yet when I got the old one, and folks, in that span there’ve been technological advances in laundry. This high-efficiency LG has twelve wash options. When you put in clothes, it jiggles, spins a little, in pre-wash “load sensing.” You can see it deciding how much water to use. In concession to human error, once the wash cycle begins, an “add garment” message flashes. You get a one-minute window to hit pause and throw in that forgotten sock. After that, the lid locks and the program runs. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head,” says the machine. “I got this.”

My old washer rattled and roared and tried to shimmy across the floor when spinning. This one purrs softly, vibrates almost imperceptibly, and plays a cheery little melody to tell you it’s done. It has a top-loading glass door over its shiny stainless steel drum. We spent the entire first wash cycle peering into it, mesmerized.

“This is a whole new approach to doing laundry,” Phil declared.

“It has personality,” I said. “Do you think we should name it?”

Phil and I grew up poor, as I’ve probably told you a thousand times. We’re frightened by the need to spend large sums of money. And when I say large, I mean over $100. Consequently, we’ve formed a tradition over the years: after taxes, after paying off the remodel, buying a car or appliance, we go out to eat. That may seem counter-intuitive, but it works for us. Fighting fire with fire, I suppose. Our crack delivery team arrived at 6:50 and was done by 7:20. We promptly went to Buna, the coffee house down the street, to get breakfast.

I’m eating a bagel and reading email. A poetry workshop member says there’s an article about Lois Hayna in the Post today. I look around: no newspapers. Lois Hayna started this workshop group many years ago, but left it soon after I joined due to macular degeneration. Lois is 101. Moments later, I hear the older black gentleman seated near us mention the article to Yodit, our charming barista. “Wait, are you talking about the Lois Hayna article?” I ask. Yodit brings it to me immediately, then turns, and says, “I just gave your newspaper away.” “I was done,” says the gentleman, a gracious man who earlier read my husband’s mind about his cinnamon roll, some guy thing Yodit and I didn’t get and they didn’t explain. Men.

The article tells how Lois always wanted to write, took creative writing classes in college in the 1930s, but came of age in different times, married, raised children. She began writing poems in her sixties, for years wrote a poem a day, has published seven books and has enough poems for an eighth. Colorado Authors’ League is giving her their first Lifetime Achievement Award. It ain’t over til it’s over, ya’ll.

Yodit wants to know how I know her.

“Decades ago, Lois edited a magazine, and an anthology of Colorado poets I’m in, back when I was a poet.”

A young Mexican patiently waiting to order his coffee interjects: “No, no,” he corrects briskly. “Once a poet, always a poet. There’s no going back. It’s like the mob. You can’t just say, ‘I want out.’” (Or Italian. He could be Italian.) “We’ll find you and remind you. Hey, I rhymed,” he concludes cheerfully.

A tall blond woman behind him concurs. “That’s right: once a poet, always a poet.”

There’s a regular Greek chorus in this coffee shop.

“The usual, Christian?” Yodit asks the young man.

I leave the newspaper for Yodit, tapping the article with my finger. “You have to read this: it’s your homework.” Young women need to know about older women like Lois Hayna. She’s extraordinary, and a fine poet. I should have told Christian his rule has other applications. For example: once a teacher, always a teacher.

http://www.denverpost.com/lifestyles/ci_25661378/lois-hayna-at-101-colorado-springs-poet-still