I was arguing with my sister. She said that we should never wash towels with our clothing.

I was arguing with my sister Sylvie. She insisted we should never wash towels with clothes. I shrugged it off. “It saves time,” I said, tossing shirts and towels into the same load. She shook her head. “Towels are heavy, shed lint, and ruin softer fabrics.”

I rolled my eyes—until the proof started piling up. My navy blouse came out covered in fuzz. My black leggings looked worn out after just a few months. Then the real blow: my favorite cream sweater shrank to half its size. Sylvie didn’t even gloat. She just said, “You can save time, or you can save your clothes.”

I finally did the research: towels are rougher, hold more water, and put extra strain on delicate fabrics. Basically, I’d been destroying my wardrobe to save twenty minutes.

So I changed. Clothes in one load, towels in another. Suddenly, my colors stayed brighter, fabrics softer. Sylvie noticed right away: “Finally joined the dark side, huh?” But a few weeks later, she called in a panic—her washer wouldn’t drain. I checked the filter and found it clogged with towel lint and coins. She looked embarrassed. “Guess I’m not perfect either.”

That’s when it clicked: neither of us had it all figured out. She taught me to protect my clothes, I taught her to clean her filter. And now laundry day is a running joke—we FaceTime, fold, and laugh at how seriously we once argued about it. In the end, it wasn’t about laundry at all. It was about listening, learning, and realizing that cutting corners now can ruin something valuable later.