#NoProIroMo

MrsM
There is a huge pile of ironing in my future.

BB
Just do the damn ironing.

MrsM
It's more complicated than that.

BB
Yes, you and the ironing seem to have a deep-rooted issue.

MrsM ponders this valuable insight
and decides that June will be the month of
No Procrastination, Iron More.
She feels gloomy already.

The Iron Age

The Ironing Maid
Thomas Harrington Wilson

You might think that
with so much time at my disposal
the ironing basket would be empty.
You would be wrong.

Turns out I have an attitude problem.

I am trying to address this
by downloading audiobooks.
28 hours of Anthony Trollope
seems suitable punishment .

MrsM in the confessional

MrsM is having a one-to-one with her ironing guru.

Ironing Guru
Tell me exactly how you feel

MrsM
"It’s a feeling deep within your heart,
one you try to ignore, of heaviness.
Of dread and discouragement.
Of sadness and guilt and collapse."

Ironing Guru
How do you respond to this feeling?

MrsM
"I want to fall on a bed and shut out the world.
But that doesn’t work,
because the feeling follows me into bed,
and actually intensifies until finally
I have to get out of bed to try to escape it."

Ironing Guru
"You must take action!
Otherwise your life will degrade
to a point where you don't respect yourself."

MrsM
I have gone significantly beyond that point.
I have THREE ironing piles.

Ironing Guru
Follow my four step plan for ironing Nirvana
1.
"See the problem in perspective:
it's not the End of the World."

(MrsM "it feels like like it...")

2.
"Reframe the failure:
it's not you who are failing,
it's your method."

(MrsM "no kidding")

3.
"Change the method:
add some accountability."

(MrsM "Oh dear - I see MrM as Ironing Monitor")

4.
Iron the first shirt :
Just Do It

(MrsM "Deep, deep sigh of despair")

Ironing Guru
"The single [shirt] you iron today
is the antidote
to the soul-tearing effects of failure."

MrsM
Right.

*****

with apologies to Leo of zenhabits

an experiment

‘Drink your tea slowly and reverently,
as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves
– slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future.’
Thich Nhat Hanh

John Wrangham, London 1830-1831

MrsM has been recharging her batteries
by reading the blog zenhabits
and was very inspired by this post

Leo says...
'Yesterday I had tea with a Daoist tea monk
who said for tea to change you,
you have to create a sacred space
in your heart for the tea.

Elkington & Co., Birmingham, 1857

MrsM reads on...
Imagine that space for a moment.
How does it feel?
What can reside in that sacred space?
How different is it from mechanically drinking tea,
without paying attention to it?'

Christopher Dresser , Sheffield 1879

MrsM is impressed by this concept
and wonders if she can apply it
to other aspects of her life.

Andrew Fogelberg, London 1778-1779

She tries replacing the word 'tea'
with the word 'ironing'.

Konoike, Yokohama 1890-1895

Early indications are not promising.

*****

all images
© Victoria and Albert Museum, London
many thanks to the Victoria and Albert Museum
for their enlightened policy on digital images

hiatus

Woman Ironing
(La repasseuse)
Pablo Picasso (1881 - 1973)

I regret to announce that
due to the fact that I spent
too much time at the weekend
admiring my shiny new iPad
there is a slight laundry crisis
that I must attend to.

Can you talk among yourselves?

nihil novi

Pierre Bonnard (1867 - 1947)
Modele se deshabillant

MrsM looks in her wardrobe
and says to herself
"If only I can find ONE thing to wear
that is clean AND ironed
I absolutely PROMISE that
I will never ever EVER be so chaotic
about my laundry and ironing again."

And MrsM hears a stern voice
inside her head
which says
"You said that yesterday."

Mansard Roof

The young academic asks me why I am not writing
and I tell him that
too many things are getting in the way.

"That's a shame"
he says.

"Well, it means that I have time to do the ironing"
I reply.

"That doesn't seem like a very good swap"
he comments.

I think of all that I have still got to write
and I can't help agreeing with him
but I say
"Maybe...
but I think it is what I need to do right now."

Reflections on laundry

The Laundress
Edgar Degas

Half Term has arrived...
and not a moment too soon.

I feel flattened.

Time to rest,
go shopping with MissM
and perhaps do some ironing.

Back soon.