Back from extinction

Sighted behind a London home flapping in the summer breeze.

The clothesline was a dying feature of Canadian urban live. In some suburbs long clotheslines were banned. If one felt driven to hang wet laundry outside, exposing all to the neighbourhood, a circular, rotating line was the only type allowed.

Three years ago all this changed when Premier Dalton McGuinty lifted the ban on outdoor clotheslines by overruling the common suburban bylaw. McGuinty said the move was aimed at curbing the use of energy-sucking clothes dryers, which burn up to six per cent of Ontario's power.

In explaining the change, McGuinty said:

"There's a whole generation of kids growing up today who think a clothesline is a wrestling move."

Hmmm. I guess there's was a whole generation, mine, who thought a wrestling move was a way to dry laundry.