It’s Boxing Day. Your kitchen worktops are groaning under piles of plates, roasting dishes, pans and champagne glasses. If you’re struggling to persuade anyone in your house to fill the sink with hot soapy water, you should first hand them a copy of Mark Mason’s piece in the Christmas issue of the Spectator, ‘The tao of washing up’. Mark writes that washing up is ‘therapeutic’, a ‘Zen-like state where troubles disappear and inspiration thrives’, threatened only by ‘evil’ dishwashers. He also details how to get the most satisfaction from a session at the sink:
Like all truly noble endeavours, washing up has time-honoured rituals. ‘Washing as you cook’ is a particular pleasure, allowing regular hits of the drug amidst your peeling and boiling. Real aficionados even extend this to ‘washing as you eat’. Grayson Perry’s wife says he does ‘that wonderful, restful thing of washing up all the dishes between the main course and dessert’.
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