Our previous dishwasher, which was only about eight years old, stopped working last month for no particular reason. So my wife has ordered a new machine. Meanwhile, the dishwasher, primarily, is me.
Initially, this bugged me somewhat. It was just one more thing in an already busy day. But as I thought about it, it really wasn’t taking more time than the machine. After all, we’d load the washer and then almost all of the items on the lower level would get clean, but only about half of the things on the top, so someone -usually me – had to rewash them anyway.
Besides, I rather like washing dishes. Maybe it’s the Pisces in me that loves the warm water.
And as I was cleaning them this past weekend, I flashed back to my childhood, when washing the dishes was my primary household task besides cleaning my room. I was, even then, very good at it. And it had other values.
Back in fourth grade, our teacher used to check our fingernails to see if they were clean; even then, I thought this was bizarre. Mine usually were untidy from playing in the dirt. And she would send reports home along with our grades; I was REALLY BAD at health, and the cleanliness of the fingernails was largely what we were graded on. BUT if I had the chance to wash the breakfast dishes, then my fingernails would be satisfactory.
Come check my nails; they are REALLY clean these days.