The Misfit

I can’t remember how old my dishwasher is. It might be thought that this is a trivial matter, except to people who hold annual parties for their white goods, but it could demonstrate a troubling hole in my memory. My husband says it’s not very old; 3 or perhaps 5 years (and he is the Sage and I generally defer to him in matters of accuracy) but I remember it going wrong a couple of Christmases ago and we paid for a new motor, but were unsure whether it was worth it on such an old machine.

So that’s worse, if it’s not a hole in my memory it’s one in his and he’s the reliable one.

Our first dishwasher was bought with most of a small legacy from an old lady that my mother unwisely befriended in the early 60s. I say unwisely because she was already a crabby old bird and she lived until December 1984 when she was 101. And a half. She came to visit us every Thursday; stayed for lunch, tea and dinner (oh yes, we knew how to entertain) and was returned home for the night. Thursdays were not our favourite day of the week.

You may think I’m mean. I have justification – an example? My father died suddenly and, as soon as she heard, Miss Fitt, as I’ll call her, came to see my mother. Mother was surprised and touched to see her – how kind of her, she thought, to come straight to comfort me. ‘Yur’ burst out Miss Fitt, ‘now you’ll know what it is to be lonely!’

However, in her last year I brought her some pleasure by taking my new baby to visit her. She was delighted; held him upside down and called him David, which wasn’t his name; nothing like it, but no matter.

Anyway, why I thought it was a good idea to buy an electrical appliance with money from a malevolent old woman who had blighted my childhood Thursdays, I don’t know. But this machine went wrong with evilly timed regularity. You only know when a dishwasher has malfunctioned when it is full of dirty dishes, so it has to be emptied and the stuff washed by hand; no great job usually but it always happened at Christmas or when people were staying and it was extremely inconvenient.

Finally it was replaced. But has that one been superseded since? I do not know. 3 dishwashers in 20 years or only 2?

Thank goodness I’m going on holiday in a couple of weeks. Life is just too exciting here.