Washing Dishes

This morning, I fell in love with washing the dishes. Since my dishwasher broke several months ago and fixing it is complicated by the fact that I would have to rip up the tile floor to pull it out, I wash my dishes by hand every morning. So I was thinking about this Billy-Collins-falling-in-love thing, and I realized that I was in love with this simple task. In the house I grew up in, my mother never had a dishwasher. She also never let me wash the dishes. She said she enjoyed doing it herself. And she would stand at the kitchen sink every evening after dinner, silently washing the dishes and placing them almost lovingly in the drying rack. Looking back, I suppose this was the quietest part of her day.

But I wanted to wash the dishes! Peggy and Joanne, my best friends next door, got to wash the dishes every night. In the summer, I would go over there after dinner (to the house that I spent more time in than my own) and they would let me help. Peg was in charge of washing, and she would always squeeze the dish-soap bottle so that tiny soapy bubbles would erupt into the air for our amusement. And she would sing crazy songs while she did this, songs like “Istanbul (Not Constantinople)” or “Monster Mash.” After the dishes were done, we trekked outside to "burn the papers." There was a big old rusted oil drum in the backyard into which all paper trash would go, and we got to play with fire as the evening darkened. Every night.

Peggy and Joanne had CHORES. I didn't have any chores. I wanted chores.

Many years later, when my mother sold her house and moved into a senior apartment, she had a dishwasher. She used it to store her pots and pans. She continued to wash her dishes by hand, but we began to notice that they were never clean. I guess she was going through those age-old motions but not really paying attention. Who knows where her mind was traveling?

I am mindful of all these things when I wash my own dishes. I think of Peggy almost every time. And I pay close attention to whether or not my dishes are clean, as if that will stop me from a future relationship with Alzheimers.

Today, I fell in love with washing the dishes.