dishwashing

My coworker, a busboy of four years, has left to pursue a plumbing job in a town some thirty miles away. The remnants of a meal and a broken pipe; one is another seen through a foggy mirror; both incidents require a certain level of competence, a fine amount of dexterity, a lack of contempt for grit and detritus. There is also an inherent impulse to clean, repair, tinker.

In saying his goodbyes, my coworker saved his most heartfelt for last: the utility man (dishwasher being too harsh of a title). A hard-working man, he puts in twelve hours of labor a day, every day, in the hopes of accruing enough money for his family. They wait for him in Brazil as he waits to reenter their sanctity. He is a father to children my age; he is a husband; he lives alone in an apartment and self-prescribes three hours of sleep per night. A balding man, he is as proud of his potbelly as he is of his craft, of his language, of his cheer. When the departing busboy shakes this man’s hand goodbye, I do not think there is total comprehension. The boundary of language obscures meanings. While we have a few words to share (Pepsi, water,help), much is lost in the wash; much is still adrift.

My mother once told me about her childhood pet, a collie named Barney. The neighbors loved Barney; they thought ahead to prepare extra food for him, or they left their scraps for him to enjoy. When he was older and in the throes of decline, Barney broke from my mother’s hold and fled to the woods. He wanted to die alone. It was as if he knew he was dying, and breaking free from a tether, an embrace, was part of the experience.

So maybe it is true that dogs are codependent, but when it is their time to die, they welcome the opportunity for escape. If this was not true of Barney, then perhaps he made for the woods to wrestle with oblivion, to look up and see light shimmering through leaves, the rusty bark of trees, the expanse of dirt and underbrush, this despite the looming quietus.

My coworker was good at his work. He understood that the aim of bussing a table is to make a ghost of the customer: the breaking of bread an act of the past, the drinking of the wine now a memory. Thank you, hope to see you soon followed by Here you are, enjoy. A new goodbye followed by a newer hello, a table for two reseated again and again.