“My second favorite household chore is ironing. My first one being — hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint.” ~ Erma Bombeck

I can’t even begin to tell you how much I empathise with this statement. Really.

There are very few things that I abhor in life. But if I had to pin point one, it has to be the ironing.

I’ve had a doomed relationship with this electrical device since my school days.

Early mornings in Shillong used to be cold. I would just about manage to wake up, iron my uniform, knot the tie in the right manner and rush out of the house, just in time to hear the school bell in the distance. Thankfully, school was just about 5 minutes down the road from our house.

So one fine day, in a winter’s daze, blissfully unaware of my previous actions, I set off for school. My mom and dad had already left for the day for their respective workplaces.

When I came back, all I saw was an enraged mother (and as you all know, that is not a pretty sight).

“Do you know what you’ve done?” she demanded? I assumed she didn’t really want my response to the question and I meekly followed her inside. In the back of my mind, I guess I already knew that it couldn’t be something good.

Look, she pointed at the scarred remains of a part of the ironing table. There was a black pit just below where the iron was placed. Thankfully, the table hadn’t burst into flames. Earlier, the irons weren’t really advanced so once you switched them on they didn’t go off automatically.

I was talking with my mom on the phone the other day and reminded her of this incident. “I still have that table,” she says!

That was around when my hate affair with the iron began. And it hasn’t waned over the years. It has only gathered steam, I must admit. I’ve tried getting myself those devices where you can control almost everything but inevitably I land up burning myself on some part of my body or another. And getting none of my clothes ironed.

Nowadays, I try and keep my interaction with the device at a minimum. The friendly neighbourhood istriwalla has solved much of my problems and taken away the stress of this totally digusting chore. I can do anything else : wash clothes, wash dishes, wash the house etc.

But ironing! Shudder.