To the Author of My Dishwasher User's Manual, Thank You
I am writing today to express my gratitude to the author of the 32-page manual that came with my dishwasher. While there are many things I appreciated about it, I believe your masterstroke can be found on page 11:
Do not wash dishes before loading them into the Maytag Jetclean dishwasher.
What an intriguing sentence. The first thing I notice about it is that it serves no purpose for the manufacturer. Shouldn't Maytag be content to let you scrub, scrub away before loading in your dishes, thus making the dishwasher seem completely infallible?
I can only conclude that this was a writer who took matters into his own hands. One who said, "To every husband out there whose wife made him clean the dishes by hand and, on top of it, give them a second cleansing in the dishwasher – this one's for you!"
Sometimes I ponder the grammar of this little sentence. At first glance, it seems boring and stale. Though just a short sentence, it repeats the words "wash" and "dish." But the more you read it, the more you appreciate its little complexities. Is it not gently mocking those who would have a dish washed twice? The redundancy of the language denotes the redundancy of the action.
But there is a deeper subtlety, and one that to me belies true relationship wisdom. What it does not say is, "Anyone who washes their dishes by hand before putting them in a dishwasher is a dumbass." It takes the more neutral tone of, "It is not good for this dishwasher to be loaded with clean dishes." By taking the specific case, it does not call up all the arguments that have existed before this dishwasher. And there have been many. This is a sentence amenable to both parties, allowing neither to say, "I was right, so nyeh nyeh nyeh." Bravo. Bravo!
Dishwasher manual writer, you rule. I know you never got a byline, but, if you stumble across my blog, please know that there is at least one person out there who appreciates your gift.
Do not wash dishes before loading them into the Maytag Jetclean dishwasher.
What an intriguing sentence. The first thing I notice about it is that it serves no purpose for the manufacturer. Shouldn't Maytag be content to let you scrub, scrub away before loading in your dishes, thus making the dishwasher seem completely infallible?
I can only conclude that this was a writer who took matters into his own hands. One who said, "To every husband out there whose wife made him clean the dishes by hand and, on top of it, give them a second cleansing in the dishwasher – this one's for you!"
Sometimes I ponder the grammar of this little sentence. At first glance, it seems boring and stale. Though just a short sentence, it repeats the words "wash" and "dish." But the more you read it, the more you appreciate its little complexities. Is it not gently mocking those who would have a dish washed twice? The redundancy of the language denotes the redundancy of the action.
But there is a deeper subtlety, and one that to me belies true relationship wisdom. What it does not say is, "Anyone who washes their dishes by hand before putting them in a dishwasher is a dumbass." It takes the more neutral tone of, "It is not good for this dishwasher to be loaded with clean dishes." By taking the specific case, it does not call up all the arguments that have existed before this dishwasher. And there have been many. This is a sentence amenable to both parties, allowing neither to say, "I was right, so nyeh nyeh nyeh." Bravo. Bravo!
Dishwasher manual writer, you rule. I know you never got a byline, but, if you stumble across my blog, please know that there is at least one person out there who appreciates your gift.
posted by Porterman at 8:01 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home