Water Water Everywhere

Nor any drop to wash a dish.
The Rime of the Ancient Dishwasher

Thursday was a great day of food and family.

And then it happened...Let me splain.

Thursday evening, after the day and the family were spent. I stood in my kitchen and stared up at all the dishes stacked precariously on the counter. And in the sink. And some on the stove. And I'm pretty sure there were more in the living rooms.

Of course you ask, why Dana? Why so many?

Well, I shall tell you my inquisitive ones. There were the ones from Thanksgiving Morn Breakfast, a grand tradition in the Moya household.

And then there were the ones from cooking the wonderful 15 course meal required on this day of thanks. Plus snacks. Plus the fine china we supped upon. Okay not really, we used paper plates but the silverware was for reals y'all.

Plus the 20 thousand cups used but one time each by 2 children who, it seems, cannot have their precious delicate lips touch the rim of a cup more than once for fear of death causing germs. The very same children who try to refuse a shower for days on end despite the fact that they smell like the end of a barnyard animal who has wallowed in his own muck because "they are not dirty."

Oh, then there was the 10 or 50 or so containers emptied of their long forgotten leftovers (I know, shame on us) because someone (cough! Dana! cough!) thought it a brilliant plan to clean the refrigerator NOW since the trash men cometh on Friday and there was need of room for the new leftovers of our feast.

I normally wash dishes as I cook but this day we were painting and sanding. It was Eddie's turn to wash on the chore chart but I figured I would take down Mount Dinnerware for him. He is not the skilled climber I am. What a mom. My children rise and call me blessed.

Blessed mother I have nothing to wear!
As they stand in front of a closet full of clothes.
Blessed mother I cannot find the ____!
As they sit not two feet from missing object.
Blessed mother there is nothing to eat!
As they stand in front of the refrigerator looking at 10 or 50 or so tubs of leftovers.

And why not just throw them to the dishwasher? That dear sweet beloved appliance died some time ago. Probably from many a climb up the Dinnerware Mountain. May it rest in peace. We will one day replace it. Sniff. It's a sensitive subject. Let's move on shall we?

Where were we? Oh yes...The mountain stared back at me, taunting me, daring me to bring it on. I grabbed my gear (dish-mountain climbing gear, chisel, saw and sandblaster) and walked towards my foe.

Then from somewhere deep, deep, deep in the bowels of the earth came a groan. And then the sink gave a visible shudder. I cried out in a triumphant voice "Ha, I've got you now you vile fiend...you are trembling with fear....your doom draws near!"

Then the cursed thing threw up on me. Merely anxious about the coming flood of dishes, I figured. No matter, I would not be deterred from my duty. I approached yet again and looked into the soul of the sink, laying in its own vomit, visibly shuddering in the the throes of death.

Alas, no matter what I did, or how I tried, the blasted sink would not be revived. So, I did what anyone else would do in this situation, I called in reinforcements.

Honey?!?!? Can you come here?

"I'll show you!" I whispered to the sink.

2 hours later the underbelly of the beast was gutted, its shredded entrails laid in an indeterminate pattern over the kitchen floor. I thought I could see the outline of the Pope in one of the blood stains, but I'm not too sure about it now.

The Mountain? Completely unmoved. And I think growing....*shudder*

The sink? Oh friends, it is an ugly tale of woe.

It seems the pipe that goes into the wall - way, way, way down into the wall, where cutting of sheet rock and wood and the digging up of yard and quite probably foul curses must take place - had cracked. This somehow caused the pipes under the sink to back-up into the house and regurgitate all over Dana.

Call a plumber? Bite your tongue. And while your at it, bite your lip and nails and...I am glad to have a husband who is able to repair most anything we own. But lo, 36 hours and many a trip to the Home Depot later we still have no sink to wash a dish in. Of course things of so-called import (like sleep) have intervened on his behalf. Whatever. Yes but dears, we have saved quite a pretty penny.

A pretty penny I could use to take my dishes down to the local Dish-O-Mat with. Throw these crusty boys into the industrial super-colossal Dishwasher of the immortals with the rest of the non-dishwasher-owning people of the world, and sit and watch it spin. And be done with them in one foul blow.

Or I could just chuck the dity ones into the trash with the leftovers and run out to Target and purchase.....

If only.

No fear my loves, the dishes were washed, um, eventually. I will spare you the details. Suffice it to say, Mount Dinnerware is no more.

Although I'm sure it will be back soon. In smaller, less daunting hills. I will leave those to my children to climb. It is good exercise.

And one day, one glorious and fine day, I will have my very own lave-vasaille. That's French for dishwasher.

I had to look it up. But for one second you were impressed with my muy bueno linguistic skills weren't you?

Until that day....

We never know the worth of water until the well is dry.
Thomas Fuller