Losing One’s Composure

Suppose, theoretically speaking, a person decided to wash the pots and pans from last night’s spaghetti dinner the following morning, and that person had an appointment so she was in somewhat of a hurry.

Yes, she should really have done the dishes the night before, when the plates and glasses and such got run through the dishwasher, but after a busy day capped with guests for dinner, she was tired. So the pots sat patiently on the stove overnight, which gave them a chance to bond fully with the bits of spaghetti sauce and pasta starch clinging to their insides.

This person first moved the composting bucket from the sink to the counter so she could fill the sink with hot soapy water to soak the pots. This bucket, a handy-dandy object she had made herself by cutting off the top of a square plastic laundry soap container, holds about a gallon of vegetable peelings, fruit rinds, egg shells, and such. It was full. And yes, she should really have taken it out the night before.

While the pots were soaking, the person opened the dishwasher, pulled out the top rack, and began to put away the clean dishes. Moving quickly—she had an appointment, remember—she reached up to put some glasses into the cupboard, pulled her arm down, and caught the composting bucket with her elbow. It promptly tipped itself in precisely the right direction to regurgitate its contents over the edge of the counter into the dishwasher.

The person responded with colorful language, including a word or two that some of her grandchildren would be shocked to know she knew.

Picking strawberry tops, carrot peelings, grape stems, and blackened banana peels off of cups and glasses that were clean and gleaming a moment earlier wouldn’t really have been so bad. But the fact that they were garnished with little worm-like spaghetti remnants and leftover sauce made the chore somewhat less than appealing.

Oh, well. If one is going to dirty a bunch of dishes in one fell swoop of a misplaced elbow, at least it helps to be efficient enough to do it when they’re already in the dishwasher. And if one is going to dump scraps out on the compost pile to return to nature, it probably doesn’t hurt to have them well mixed ahead of time. The person even managed to make it to her appointment on time, leaving a reasonably clean kitchen behind her.

And thankfully, no one was around to hear the colorful language, even though it was completely understandable. Nor would we want to further humiliate this person by revealing her identity. The whole experience, after all, was already decomposing.