If Dishes Were Wishes
A procrastinator writes an essay to delay doing the washing-up.
When I found myself trying to fit the pointed end of a meat cleaver into my coffee cup to stir the sugar, I figured I really should do the washing up. I glanced over at it. Well, I say glanced. Do you ever glance at something that fills you with horror? It’s more of a furtive squint. I’m not someone who likes to face my shame head on, after all.
Also, full disclosure: I would rather write this essay about not doing the washing up than actually do it. So, it’s still out there, in the kitchen, doing that thing dirty crockery does in retaliation for being left on the side like a Tinder user with no right swipes. It’s getting crusty.
You may say I’m crazy for implying that the dishes are doing anything, apart from sitting — or balancing — precariously where I left them yesterday… a few days ago. And I can see why you would think that, but you are wrong. You may be a person with a dishwasher. Or a servant. Or a sense of domestic responsibility. Or, perhaps you have fewer dishes than I do. I mean, I can go four days without needing to wash up. That shows how I’m a sucker for reduced crockery in a sale. Though it’s annoying how it takes several washes for the superglued ‘SALE’ label to come off. And, considering, you know, how I’ve already intimated that I don’t enjoy washing dishes regularly, then you’ll understand that price tag is around for a while.
People also like to buy me plates, and cups and bowls. They’ve probably seen the constant stack of washing up. They’ll know, as they wrap the gift for my birthday, or Christmas, that they are not only buying me a thing, they are buying me time. That’s a rare gift.
I’ve been told I’m a procrastinator. And, as somebody famous once said, ‘the dishes don’t lie.’ (I think they said that.)
But this reminds me, I haven’t gotten around to explaining to you yet why I think the washing up isn’t simply out there, in my kitchen, passively letting time tick by. It’s doing something. It’s interacting with the universe. And also with whatever field of physics explains the chemical reactions necessary to bake on the most malleable, or liquified, food, into a new chemical compound that is utterly waterproof.
Believe me, I know that when I finally face up to my responsibilities and act like a civilised human, the chore is going to take considerably longer than if I had tackled it a day or two ago.
And herein, is a lesson to be learned. That learning lessons doesn’t work.
I know you’ll likely be anxious about those dishes, now that you’ve read this. You may worry just how highly stacked the crockery has got — especially if you have checked the date this article was published and some days have since passed. Perhaps you’ll be concerned I’m lying beneath it, after a tiny gnat alighted upon its top edge and was the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Well, I can’t reassure you too much. It is a possibility. So, check back now and again to see if there is a follow-up article about my victory over the leftovers. If you see no such article, it’s possible one of several scenarios has played out. I won’t reveal them all here, in case the dishes truly are sentient and we are locked in a battle of wills like chess grandmasters, as I suspect. But one of them involves renting my place out.
If any of this piece is relatable to you, I wish you well, my friend. And, perhaps you will share my slight resentment that I was brought up too well and, as a kid, trained out of the habit of licking my bowl clean. But not well enough to avoid being a slob.
I’m joking. I’m allergic to washing-up liquid. Yeah, that sounds authentic. Remember me by that line, instead.
