Flora Milford, Op-Ed Editor

The laundry situation at Beloit College has long been debated. Is it okay to take someone’s laundry out of the dryer when the cycle is up? What about moving it from the washer to the dryer? Taking it out of a machine mid-cycle because you have a spiffy new top that you just have to wear out tonight (but it stinks like thrift store so it needs a soapy spin)? 

Or, perchance, is it ok to leave someone’s sopping wet clothing on the top of the dryer because God isn’t real and if He was you’d get 1000 volts straight to the nipples just for THINKING of doing that? 

So yeah, people have a lot of opinions. Well, fear not, because I am going to tell you the truth about the whole shebang, and proselytize God’s laundry room commandments. So sit down, buckle up, and put some jazzy tunes on the aux, my sweet passenger princess–mama’s got it from here. 

To lay the groundwork for my argument, we are going to assume that you’ve made the trek downstairs to do a big ol’ stinky load of laundry. When you get there, to your exasperation, all of the washers are being used. But then, a glimmer of hope–one of the washers has just finished its cycle. Your eyes dart around the room–you’re alone, and the next cycle won’t be over for ten more minutes. For extra precaution you peek your head into the hallway – there’s no one around. A fervor washes over you: it’s both guilty and zealous. Your animal instincts take over, now it’s just you and those washers, but the intensity is almost too much. Where do you go from here? This is where I step in. 

First things first: you are absolutely never allowed to put wet clothing anywhere but into a dryer. This comes with a preposition. You are also never allowed to turn said dryer on. You don’t know if this person wants to dry everything they’ve put in the washer. Perhaps they’re washing a favorite pair of jeans–it would be inhumane to throw them in the dryer and put them at risk of shrinking. What you’re going to do (after a second glance to make sure no one is watching) is open up a dryer, de-lint it if necessary, and faster than a roach scuttles from a turned-on light, throw every single item from that washer into the dryer. Now comes the hard part as your instincts will be telling you to shut that door and run as far as you can from the evidence. You are not going to shut that door. You’re going to leave it open to ensure it doesn’t mold and that the person doing laundry can find it. I know it’s tempting to turn it on, but how would you feel if someone did that to you and all your whites turned blue? 

Now it’s free range. Shove your stuff into that washer. It’s all yours, baby, and your hands are clean. On the off chance that the owner of the clothing in the washer you just emptied walks in, nothing is incriminating about the situation except for the guilty look on your face and the perspiration on your brow. But think about it like this – you did that person a favor in reserving that dryer for them. They have nothing to be but grateful. 

You go upstairs, set your alarm for 31 minutes, and doink around whilst you wait. Then, thirty seconds before said alarm goes off, head back down to the laundry room so no one can do to you what you did to said person from earlier. When you get to the room, pray a dryer is free. If not, I’m sorry to say that you will just have to set an alarm and wait for the soonest cycle to finish up. Likely, however, what will happen is that a cycle will be up, but there will be a pile of dreaded clothing in the machine. Bah humbug, whatever shall you do? This leads us to one of the largest, most controversial questions when it comes to the laundry room: can you take someone’s dry clothing from the dryer? 

The short answer is yes. The longer answer is absolutely. They’ve left their stuff there and you have no idea when they’ll come to get it. It could be five minutes, it could be all day. I’ve been the schmuck to do this and I’m sure you have, too. If you have any basic human empathy, you understand that if your clothing is dry, you’ve relinquished your dryer privileges. If someone wants to use the dryer and put your stuff on top of it, the only thing you can do to stop this is get to your laundry when the cycle ends. 

In short, the rules of the laundry room are this: no wet stuff anywhere but the dryer, you CAN move someone’s wet clothes to the dryer but you MUST leave it open and you CANNOT turn it on, you are absolutely allowed to take someone’s dry clothing out of the dryer (with the understanding that if they catch you doing this they might be peeved), and last but not least, no waffle stomping in the laundry room – too stinky there already, save that for the shower. <3