5 life lessons from washing dishes

I have been washing my own dishes since 2017 after deciding that a single man living alone should not need a housemaid My kitchen is an area of about 45 square metres with a stainless steel double sink To its left is a small rack for washed utensils with a plastic tray to collect the drip My kitchen is undeniably charming mdash whitetiled warmly lit with hanging lights and full of happy surprisesHowever it is part of an openplan living room so its appearance affects my living roomrsquos aesthetics A kitchen sink full of greasy dishes is a scandal in my living roomMy first lesson in this menial space was Donrsquot leave dishes unwashed too longWashing up tout de suite is now a deeply ingrained habit my gleaming sink fills me with pride More important this attitude has leached over into my daily life If something needs fixing I find myself doing it right away rather than ldquoleaving it in the sinkrdquoOver the years I began noticing things about dishwashing things a housemaid or a mother would miss because they always wash up in a jiffy I began asking borderline philosophical questions such as how could you tell if a black nonstick dosa tava was truly cleanI evolved into a mindful dishwasher wallowing in the Zen of cleaning up having sudsy eureka moments saucepaninduced satori Every dishwashing lesson I now realise hides a profound life lesson And the time has come to share some of them1 The thing that cleans soon becomes very dirty I use limescented dishwashing detergent in a repurposed marble mortar But the sunny yellow liquid will be cloudy grey and gritty well before itrsquos even half empty The sponge clean at first dirties the soap solution with each dip while getting soiled itself Soon my dishes are clean but the cleaning tools are filthy Tip donrsquot try to use every last drop of soap water or wait till the sponge is in shredsLife lesson The spotless can become the sullied unless you are constantly paying attention The shiniest parts of you will become grimy if you donrsquot regularly attend to them Principles decay values decline and you stop being the best you can be What makes some priests charged with keeping souls clean turn into childabusing paedophiles2 Wash the little things first A sink full of dirty dishes can be a depressing sight especially late at night after a party when all the guests have left These days I start with the spoons and forks In minutes they have disappeared leaving only a few large utensils Of them I deal next with the unwieldy plates so large that they donrsquot even sit well in the sink With those gone I feel suddenly lighter with just three or four pans to goLife lesson When problems pile up and you see stress everywhere you look deal with the small easy ones first A few big dogs are easier to manage if yoursquove gotten the yapping poodles out of the way3 Leave difficult dishes to soak In my second year of dishwashing I learned that a rinse with water should come before a scrub with soap Water sweeps away the solids soap takes care of the rest But as for those nasty charred utensils leave them full of water and forget about them They will all surrender softly when you come back an hour laterLife lesson Walk away from the things you cannot solve and return later Time dissolves the most obstinate problems4 Therersquos grime on the fridge and the wall One day I noticed that the fridge to the right of the sink and the tiled wall behind it were splotchy with caked grime Dishwashing creates splashes and the spray must land somewhere Except that with tunnel vision I never looked anywhere but the sink It took me an hour to scrub them back to lifeLife lesson Time and again dishwashing has taught me that getting something clean makes something else dirty whether itrsquos the sponge the soap water the wall or the fridge Whatever you do look for the unintended consequencesWhat about that deep question about how to tell when your black nonstick tava is truly clean5 Check with your fingers first The saucepan looked clean but my fingers detected small gritty grainy particles Your fingers can detect what your eyes canrsquot see Human fingers can feel objects as small as 13 nanometers Put differently if your finger was the size of the planet it would feel the gap between your house and your car Now I always touchtest my washed dishes before I inspect themThis may be the biggest life lesson donrsquot believe everything you see because sometimes your eyes see what they want to see Consult your instinct God is in the detailsHere viewed from there C Y Gopinath in Bangkok throws unique light and shadows on Mumbai the city that raised him You can reach him at cygopigmailcomSend your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper