Out Fitted Sheet

Sometimes innovations in the home, don't work and fitted sheets are one. When they came out I thought they were a fine idea. Advertised to save time for the busy housewife whatever she was, I a working mother and spouse, bought them thinking they would be wonderful.  As time went on, after years of putting up with struggling fingers and wrists getting fitted sheets onto the new big mattresses, that war is over. The fitted sheet and I were enemies from the start. As I say, the idea is wonderful, but the people who make them can't be. Simply put, they skimp on their measurements which means I have to either buy fitted sheets that are too large or fight with the "right" sized corners to get them to stay where they should stay. Now, reformed to a flat sheet fan, I prefer to fold neatly the unfitted bottom sheet smartly into its corners with a quick tuck. When I want to remove sheets on wash day,  I can  whip them off and into the washing machine in a jiff.  No more walking to the other side of the room to  say "please" and beg each fitted corner to come off.  One good tug or two of the straight sheets and we are off and into the wash basket like a bar of wet soap. Also when I empty the dryer of its weekly load of sheets, I no longer with flat sheets, have to search to extricate the small things that lurk in the stitched corners such as stray socks, washcloths and knickers. Nothing can hide from me when flat sheets come out of the washer and go into the dryer. Or out of the dryer to be folded. Folding fitted sheets to lie neatly in the linen cupboard was a battle that I never did win. And I doubt that anyone ever has, due to a fitted sheet nature. I must confess that latterly, frustration with the fitted sheet led me to the laundry criminal act of cutting one corner so that the thing would lie flat on the bed. Most of the time I got away with it, but sometimes the guilty corner wandered somewhat and wrinkled up the whole mattress field. But overlooking these small mishaps, the plan generally worked quite well. Today, my horoscope said that Mercury was in some sort of phase that would bring pleasant surprises if I handled matters well. I did. I put all of the fitted sheets at the bottom of the linen closet and all of the flat sheets on top. I will use these lovely flat sheets until they wear out and they won't for years since I believe that spending good money on such essentials as they are, pays off in the long run. As to the old fitted ones, they will be used as floor wipes, paint and dust covers and car washing rags.  But from now on, no more new ones will appear in my house. That, of course, poses the problem of where to buy flat sheets all by themselves and not married badly into a set. Although it will be a challenge, somewhere, some store will sell me one flat sheet to a package and if so, I will be there with an open wallet and a smile.