Day 104- Radical Hygiene Part 1

Day 104- Radical Hygiene Part 1

This week, I will be devoting Road Toward Competency to Radical Hygiene—using traditional practices to make your hygiene regimine more healthy for you, the environment, and your budget.

When I was at Earlham College, there was quite the rumblings about so-called “radical Hygiene”. It was mostly promoted by the Womyn’s Center. With a DIY flair towards simplicity—which is all too common at Earlham—folks explore old techniques of cleanliness that have been dropped in the name of progress.

Let me first take a step back and say there are few things on my list that I hate more than progress for progress sakes. Now, do not get me wrong. I am hardly a luddite. I love a lot about technology. I love my iPod and cross-continental flight now takes half a day instead of half a year. And technology has done loads to make the world a better, safer place to be.

But there is so much technology we just take for granted. We just assume that we must use it because it is there. And I would like to point out that not all technology is good at what it does. And while we work harder to make this new process “better”, it seems to me we might as well just get rid of it.

And so, this is the basis behind Radical Hygiene: reclaiming traditional practices that are healthier for your body, the environment and your budget.

Today, I will begin with clothes drying. Let’s face it, clothes dryers are pretty darned awful. I wrote the following piece as an environmental justice piece for my office-

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dfctxnv4_15cnqz49f2.

Not only are clothes dryers expensive to buy and run. They are also bad for the environment and bad for your clothing. Sure, if feels good to bring your clothes out of the dryer and fold them while they are still hot and fresh. However, I think line dried clothing feels so much better.

As spring is approaching, warm sunshine and gentle breezes make it a prime-time to hang dry your clothing. Instead of investing in clothes dryers at $350-$900, a piece of rope and some clothes pins will run you less than $10. On top of that, it is free to run a clothes line. And it is expensive to run the clothes dryer.

After November, it becomes difficult to line dry. But that does not mean you have to go back to that nasty old drying machine. If you get a rack (price ranging from $10 to $110), you can still air dry indoors. I love my rack and still use it when the weather is warm so that I can dry multiple loads at a time.

This is what radical hygiene is all about, finding old ways to be more intentional with out health and actions. I hope you try some of these recommendations I have for you this week.

By the way, I am still running the poll to see which debt I should put my tax refund toward