OMG Just Take Two More Seconds And Put It In the Dishwasher!
How to have a good marriage
1. Communicate
2. Snuggle
3. Empty the dishwasher like I’ve been telling you all day, Bill.
In a marriage, the division of household labor will never be fair. If you have a vagina, you will automatically shoulder a large percentage of the household chores. That is my truth, anyway.
Oh, I give Bill a lot of shit, but he occasionally pulls his weight around the house. If making the bed in such a way that it looks like someone is still in the bed and taking out the trash a few times a month is “pulling his weight,” then yes, Bill is pulling his weight.
It usually goes something like this:
Bill: Well, this calls for a celebration! (Cracks open a beer.)
Me: You took out the trash.
I suppose Bill has good intentions when he promises to clean more, but after 30+ years together, I’ve learned that “I’ll run the vacuum” means “There is a small possibility I will run the vacuum in 7 to 10 business days…”
Most of the time, I don’t mind cleaning the house. It’s a good calorie burn, and I love how our home feels when it’s squeaky clean. Meanwhile, Bill is marked safe from having the gene that causes people to manically clean. We are two different people, you know? He can look out the window and see an armadillo eating our grass and destroying the yard, and I can look out the same window and see nothing but the fingerprints on it.
Anyway, it’s not like I’m humming and skipping merrily through the kitchen with a rag in my hand like Snow White, but I don’t bitch and moan about cleaning as much as you’d think. There is, however, one chore both Bill and I absolutely despise: Emptying the dishwasher.
Who do you think ends up emptying it on repeat? That’s right: This girl.
I can kind of understand why Bill doesn’t routinely empty the dishwasher because most of the time, he acts like he doesn’t realize we own one, perching his glass or potato chip bowl in the sink right beside the dishwasher (Pretty sure my memoir will be called, “OMG Just Take Two More Seconds And Put It In the Dishwasher!”) but I know I ploy when I see one. Bill purposely does not open the dishwasher because a few years ago, we made this rule that whoever opens the clean dishwasher has to unload it. It’s been full since 2019.
Ha ha! I’m kidding. But I’m not joking about this - on the rare occasion that Bill does empty the dishwasher, I’m expected to have a parade for him.
Usually, when my husband opens the dishwasher door and realizes it is full of clean dishes, he puts his hands above his head and slowly backs away, as if he has just tripped a wire on a bomb. You know, the old I opened the dishwasher, and it was full of clean dishes and I’m scared Danielle is going to know I know, so I need to get my ass in the garage and pretend I’m busy out there routine, or the I’m going to run to the recliner and say, “I just sat down” as an attempt to avoid participating in anything pertaining to the dishes routine.
Yeah, that’s getting old, but two can play that game.
One day, I was cleaning the kitchen after dinner, and he told me I wasn’t loading the dishwasher correctly, so I made an executive decision that loading the dishwasher should be his permanent job since he is obviously the only person in our house who can do it perfectly. I mean, clearly, I’m a f*ck up as far as dishwasher loading goes, while he is the master of perfection, so that makes sense, right?
Oh, no, no, no! He said he was just trying to help me do it better.
Alrighty then. I just have one question: How did I manage without his dishwasher supervision for the last 30 years? Gosh, the chaos! It’s amazing we all survived.
They say there are those who can’t relax when dishes are in the sink and those who don’t even notice dishes in the sink, and they marry each other. Such is life.