At least this is what my roommates and I continuously tell ourselves as we wage Dish War 2004: the ongoing battle between our pride/laziness and our ability to pick up after ourselves in the kitchen.
This morning I casually sauntered past dishes nearing their ultimate stacking capability, dishes covered in soy sauce from roomie number 1′s late night stir fry decision, dishes covered in crusty day-old eggs from roomie number 2′s morning breakfast concoction, and there embedded in the mess of iron and partially eaten food: my own filthy dinner
tupperware, left to its own decaying devices, adding its stink to the already impressive stench of silverware, glass and plastic currently lounging in our now despairing, garbage disposal-less sink.
Could I have paused for a moment, temporarily delaying my predictable morning schedule to unload the dishwasher so as to make room to transfer these, our dirty abandoned utensils and dishes, to a proper cleaning receptacle? Yes. But did I? Nope. I did, however, pause long enough to survey the unsanitary state of our kitchen and realize that I myself remained responsible for only two of the at least 18 pieces of kitchen-ware occupying the sink and now, nearby counter-top. And so, rather than swallow my pride and fight my curiosity surrounding the duration of time the sink could sit in its current condition if I myself did not take steps to remedy the situation, I decided to rationalize my already pre-decided lack of cleaning action.
My thought process went a little something like this: I, Kerri Anne Ladish, am busy. B-U-S-Y. I know that not everyone else in this house can be as dedicated, industrious and thus as cool as I am, and therefore, why can’t they, in the abundance of spare time afforded them as a result of their lazily assembled schedules, unload the dishwasher and take out the overflowing trash and clean up THEIR OWN dishes! And mydishes.
Yeah, I never admitted this thought process to be in any way logical.
Thankfully, none of my roommates could overhear this conversation with myself. Also thankfully, there is a light at the end of this tunnel seemingly darkened by my kitchen-wide pride and overly exaggerated high opinion of myself. Today that light arrived in the form of a sudden realization of how ridiculous my rationale regarding the dirty dish situation truly was, and how I couldspare the ten minutes the task required, and get off my lazy bum and unload the dishwasher and take out the trash andclean up ALL OF THEIR dishes, and ALL OF MINE, too.
Yes. I definitely lost this battle of Dish War 2004. I’ll win the next one.