What could look more New Englandly than laundry drying on the line? Blessed as we are with drilled wells and electricity, lugging water from the well, heating it on the stove, and somehow beating the stains out of the cloth is a thing of the past, except for those who chop wood and carry water for ideological reasons. That philosophy, as it is often adopted with easy superiority, can be a little insulting to the millions upon millions of women who have broken their backs and are currently doing so in hauling water and scrubbing laundry. But hey, whatever floats your boat.

Drudgery gone, the pleasures of laundry are here for the taking if you’re willing to slow down just an infinitesimal amount. Most of us here in the hill towns hang our laundry on the line the “old-fashion” way. Some of the neighbors go the extra mile with a long line strung between trees and a forked stick to push it up out of the way for the wind to play with. You’ll have to admit it doesn’t get much better than that for visual nostalgia.

I appear to prefer the less-than-scenic umbrella I bought in 1997 by way of declaration of independence which I have been nursing along and re-rigging as it has buckled under hundreds of load of laundry. It does its job quite well when it has line on it and when it doesn’t blow off its base in a whoosh; it’s been jury-rigged to a makeshift pole for years.

The technology is quite simple: Wash the laundry. Take it outside on a day that isn’t a washout. Hang it up with clothes pins and let the sun and the wind and the air get your laundry dry. Should this scheme not succeed entirely, you have choices: leave it out to dry tomorrow, bring it in to dry over the stove where you will be rewarded with fresh-laundry smell (ozone unleashed by the workings UV on water). If all else fails, bring it in and stick it in the dryer.

That last thing happens rarely around here. In this house and some others I know, October is the biggest month for the dryer. It simply is good sport to see if we can tease the machinae of nature into doing the job rather than the one made by Whirlpool that uses electricity; plus we are cheap of course.

Nature’s tools for laundry drying, are evaporation and sublimation. Evaporation is the changing of a liquid, in this case water, into a gas, in this case water vapor. Hang your laundry on a nice warm sunny day and there will be evaporating for a few hours. Sublimation is the changing of a solid into a gas without passing through the liquid state. It’s what happens when you hang your laundry outside when it is fifteen degrees Fahrenheit and sunny and windy and the dish towels change into stiff boards as soon as you hang them, and if you are not quick before you do, which can be a problem. Evaporation and sublimation are the essence of the water cycle. Did I mention the water cycle? The great engine, nay, the sine qua non of life on earth?

When you hang laundry, you’re flirting with the elemental; hitching nature to the yoke and peeking under its skirt at the same time; playing a slightly naughty game with a willing partner who evaporates madly when bid to do so on a warm sunny day. But sublimation is the better for causing deep and lasting joy: you will want the cold, crackling cry day in the depth of winter, single digits Fahrenheit or lower. Given the right conditions, it can be really fast like evaporation, but it’s generally a bit slower, and, just a frisson more, umm, unusual.

If that doesn’t turn you on you must be made of stone. But then you should be beware, the water cycle breaks rocks into grains of sand and shaves Rockies into Appalachians.

January 11, 2011: Min 21 and Max 37.

January 11, 2011: Min 21 and Max 37.

June 1, 2012: Min 41 max 67.

February 11, 2013: Min 19 and Max 41. No such luck

April 4, 2013. Min 25 and Max 52, wind at 7 mph and gusts. Evaporation

Christmas linens on December 27, 2013: Min 26 and max 32 with some wind.

Min 9 and max 30 — windy: sublime

Min 9 and max 30 — windy: sublime enough for 2 pics