A Clothesline for peace

For our Earth Day celebrations the kids and I spent the morning playing without electricity, just enjoying the beautiful day. Then that evening we spent with friends playing "whatever ball" which is a neat rendition of softball, kickball, using any kind of ball. Hence the name, whatever ball :)

Then we made a trip to the hardware store and picked up the fixings to hang a clothesline in our backyard in an attempt to lower the use of the dryer and also save money on our electric bill. However, according to my landlord, the city in which we live has an ordinance that says you are not allowed to have a clothesline or hang any clothing from porches/fences at any time.


This seemed outrageous to me. Why on earth would there be such an ordinance? Hanging your clothes to dry conserves energy which is good for the planet, and saves money!


Since I am not the kind of person to take no as an answer, i acted immediately. I called the city clerks office and spoke to a very nice woman. She informed me that while it was ridiculous, it was truly an ordinance. So, I decided to take it upon myself to have the ordinance changed. I asked the clerk to call me back with the location on the web I could find a copy of the ordinance and then diligently began researching ways to have this ordinance changed. Not of course before posting a status update on facebook letting all my friends and family know that the bag of poo was on fire in my neck of the woods...


Turns out, its extremely hard to locate information on how to go about getting an ordinance changed, most likely because the people who make and enforce the ordinances don't want them changed....


About a half our in to my research I get a call back from the nice lady at the clerks office with great news. Turns out allot of people THINK this is an ordinance but its not. It is not found in any chapter or section of the city ordinances. HOORAY!


So this morning while my little dude was happily gnawing on a teething ring riding in his sling, I hung our clothesline. Its nothing fancy, is minimal, and was cheap - exactly how I like it.


We love our clothesline and little mans dipes smell wonderful now!