𝗔𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗶𝘀𝗵𝘄𝗮𝘀𝗵𝗲𝗿

Dispatch
02-29-02024

Arturo the dishwasher is at the same time so good and so terrible at his job, firing him would be like firing a cheetah for churning up to much dust.

On a busy night, Arturo navigates a 3-compartment sink like a sponge covered 𝙏𝙖𝙨𝙢𝙖𝙣𝙞𝙖𝙣 𝘿𝙚𝙫𝙞𝙡 — rinse-wash-sanitizing so fast three become one.

During a busy Saturday night, Arturo has more than enough time to detail his skateboard in the sink. He scrubs it with an intimate delicacy I thought was reserved for newborns, four sky blue nitrile gloves stretched over the wheels. Arturo knows the importance of keeping his bearings dry.

Arturo the dishwasher takes the stairs two at a time, swinging his arms at sharp right angles like two tomahawks. He descends with the twinkly haste of a ballerina, keeping the full, heavy bus tub 𝗗-𝗘-𝗔-𝗗-𝗔-𝗦-𝗦 level.

I don’t have a clue how old Arturo is. I’d believe any answer between 25 and 75.

Arturo asks me how old I am every shift, and I say 29 every shift.

Arturo asks me how my boyfriend and I are doing every shift, and because my boyfriend are never great, I say ‘great’ every shift.

Arturo is attractive in a robust, hard living sorta way. Attractive in the way mud makes work boots attractive, or rust makes 90s trucks attractive. Attractive in a way that makes me wish I were braver.

Arturo’s face tattoos predate the post-𝗣𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗠𝗮𝗹𝗼𝗻𝗲 era of face tattoo normalization. Arturo has never seen 𝗦𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝗡𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝗟𝗶𝘃𝗲 — the ‘𝗦𝗡𝗟’ stick-n-poked on his cheekbone acronyms,

𝗦𝗛𝗢𝗪

𝗡𝗢

𝗟𝗢𝗩𝗘

Arturo once commandeered the aux cord and played 𝗞𝗶𝗱 𝗥𝗼𝗰𝗸'𝘀 1998 ballad, ‘𝗢𝗻𝗹𝘆 𝗚𝗼𝗱 𝗞𝗻𝗼𝘄𝘀 𝗪𝗵𝘆’, over the restaurant speakers for a full 45 minutes . . .

♪ 𝗜'𝘃𝗲 𝘀𝗮𝗶𝗱 𝗶𝘁 𝘁𝗼𝗼 𝗺𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗜 𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗳𝗶𝗿𝗺 ♪

♪ 𝗬𝗼𝘂 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗽𝘂𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗽𝗲𝗼𝗽𝗹𝗲 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘆 𝗱𝗲𝘀𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗲 ♪

. . . guarding that AUX like a wolf guards her pup.

Arturo came in with an arrhythmic flashing LED clipped to the neck of his plain white T, chest-side. Arturo said the cops pulled him over last night — on his skateboard — for not having a light. Arturo lets it flash his whole shift.

Arturo likes his chicken wings, ‘extra, extra crispy’.

I once heard screams coming from the dish pit and went back to see what the hell was happening. Arturo was on his smoke break. He’d left ‘Saw X’ playing on his phone at full volume.

Arturo slams out 𝓈𝓅𝒶𝓇𝓀𝓁𝒾𝓃𝑔 dishes fast enough to cuck management with 30 minute smoke breaks. He comes back with pupils in different area codes, holding a piece of scorched tinfoil and pinching the metal tip of a cake frosting bag between his lips. Arturo doesn’t care who knows.

When there are no dishes left, Arturo scrubs the floor with vigorous abandon — attacking it like the deck of a high kill-count whaling ship. Arturo is Queequeg with better stimulants. When the floor is clean, Arturo uses it for push-ups.

Arturo has a teenage daughter somewhere in New Mexico. He shows me a snapshot of him holding her on the day she was born. Arturo looks young and powerful — ready to love his daughter as much as a skateboard, and defend her like an AUX cord. The crack on his phone screen passes right between them. After seeing the long-goneness of his true youth, Arturo looks much older.

Arturo’s login profile pic for the 𝗛𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗯𝗮𝘀𝗲™ 𝗧𝗶𝗺𝗲𝗰𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗦𝗼𝗳𝘁𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗔𝗣𝗣 is clearly his old mugshot.

Arturo the dishwasher taught me that chaos is not disorder, but order moving too fast to comprehend. He is an engine too big for the chassis. I watch him wash dishes and I imagine bolts shaking loose inside him. I imagine dials redlining in his endocrine. I imagine a bandolier-clad homunculus braced to his brainstem, shouting . . .

“𝗛𝗼𝗹𝗱 . . . 𝗛𝗢𝗟𝗗!”

Arturo the dishwasher is talking to himself more often. Arturo is only ever unfriendly to people I can not see.

I’m rooting for Arturo. I don’t watch motocross for crashes. I want to see all the deadly jumps survived. I’ll miss Arturo when he’s gone, and a break from chaos would be such a relief. I don’t like that both can be true at once, that some people are too spicy to taste. Too spicy, but I tough it out and feel the burn yield to euphoric awe.

Arturo just got fired.

Arturo just got fired because he tripped a customer. He stopped mid-bus tub charge, dropped to all fours, and began scouring at a dark spot nobody could see but him. We tried to get him up but he wouldn’t budge. He stayed rooted there, scrub-arm looping like a stuck record. Then the customer tripped over him and cracked their tailbone.

Arturo has two phones and no phone number, so the manager waited for him to show up to work the next day. After hearing the news, Arturo told the manager, “via con Dios,” with a true earnest and skated due north. Arturo accepts that consequences are the cost of living with everything being permitted.

The kitchen of a restaurant is the best-of-a-bad-sanctuary. A profit-based refuge for hot coal souls with previous incarnations as swords for hire. A job where edge dwellers can tear a bit of cash off the carcass of the system, keeping their cliff-grip habits. Somebody tripped and Arturo fell overboard, landing in another three-com-sink on the Northside to wash house made aioli out of 100 ramekins at once. To scour a quarter inch of grease off the hotline hoods. To be kept as ≋F≋A≋R≋ away from the stemware as possible. To feed you.

I pick the metal piping bag tip off the drying rack. Written in 𝗦𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗽𝗶𝗲 block letters around the wide end is . . .

𝗔𝗥𝗧𝗨𝗥𝗢 𝗪𝗨𝗭 𝗛𝗘𝗥𝗘

I put it in my pocket, and remember that chaos is 𝗡𝗢𝗧 disorder.

Chaos is order moving too fast to comprehend.