It’s been a rough week in our house. Thanksgiving Day was a marvelous feast thanks to my wife’s amazing cooking. We relaxed, watched the parade in the morning, and I was on top of the clean up all afternoon. We were ahead and everything went really well.
Then Friday happened…My wife and Girl set out to get all the fall decorations put away and bring out the holiday joy! We got our tree with Boy #2, who has never gone with us. My wife had actually decorated the fake tree on Thanksgiving evening to lighten the load of Friday’s decorating. While they handled all the heavy lifting that I normally do but can’t because of surgery restrictions, I worked on setting up my Christmas village. I love it. I had a joyous time until about 7 pm. First one of my new village pieces was broken and I would need to return/replace it. Not cool!
And then…
I heard my wife calling for me so I went to the basement. And there, right behind the furnace and water heater was a pipe laying on the floor. It wasn’t connected to anything. She was confused and I was sure that hadn’t been on the floor the last time I changed the filter on October 30th. It did not take long for us to figure out that it was the vent pipe for the water heater.
FUCK. How long ago did this happen? What happened? Why?
We still have no idea when it happened. With our cats and kids, there’s often some loud strange noise from another room that we can’t always figure out. There had been several instances in the past few weeks. What happened was a ton of rust. It just rusted out the elbows holding it in place and crashed to the ground at some point, but probably not that day. Naturally the best time to find something like this is Friday evening of a holiday weekend.
My wife called the normal people we’d call for this stuff and no one answered. Then she called another company she’d heard was decent and they sponsored a thing at the art museum so they must be alright. The lovely lady took all the information and a little later a very kind man called and told us to turn off the water heater. He was unable to come that night but he would come around lunch time on Saturday.
He did not.
Instead a very young man came. He promised that he had the right elbows in his van and this would be a quick fix. He lied. He didn’t have the correct elbows and this was anything but quick. He left to pick up elbows at the shop. There was some complication with that and we somehow were going to owe more money because someone had to come open some supply area. Great, whatever. He eventually returned with the elbows.
Then within minutes he was back upstairs saying he needed to go get another pipe. Awesome. 45 minutes later he returned and promised another quick fix. He lied again. We heard tons of clanging and banging and he said he broke some things and could not get the job done because some other part needed to be fabricated. Another night with no hot water, he said. And when asked if someone would be back the next day, he stated that he did not know, he wasn’t the one on call, he was just called in to help with our “project”.
I decided that after all the time we hosted the Squatter in the spring/summer, I was going to invade that house so we could take showers. Squatter had already taken the younger two for the weekend and promised to get them showered right away. Boy #2 refused to go and so it was just two of us. The little two had already showered by the time we arrived, so that was good. It was lovely to shower, but sucky because we had to basically pack like it was an overnight trip minus the pajamas to sleep in. The house belongs to Squatter’s cousin and it needs a lot of work, but it was surprisingly clean for the Squatter.
We decided that it was highly unlikely we would get anyone out on Sunday, so we hoped for Monday. The stress of the situation and our second full day without hot water saw my wife and I starting to crumble. We had switched to paper plates at that point but needed to buy more, the kitchen sink was full, everyone needed to do laundry, and we started calling ourselves “the great unwashed.” We started fighting a bit. We were not at our best and the stress was compromising our ability to communicate effectively and our patience. Again, not our finest moment.
On Monday, the kids were off and my wife works from home. The little two were still with the Squatter. My wife called for a status update that morning and the woman on the phone said they had to get that part in and it was probably going to be mid-week before someone would be out. We were now on the third full day of no hot water and tensions were running very high. that was not acceptable and when my wife questioned her, she came back with “We can have someone out there first thing tomorrow morning.” My wife and I were communicating better, but Boy #2 hadn’t showered in several days and he started whining. Dude!! I asked the Squatter to have the younger two shower again before they came home since they would be going to school on Tuesday.
My genius wife found a good deal on a hotel that we sort of knew and it wasn’t in a bad area so we could get another shower on Monday afternoon and she’d have a place to shower on Tuesday morning before work. We also planned to drag Boy #2 to the hotel to get a shower before school started on Tuesday. The younger two came home and we went to the hotel to shower. (They are old enough to be left alone for a couple hours.)
The hotel lobby was much nicer than I expected it to be, so I was hopeful the room would be ok. It was not. We needed more towels so my wife went to get them from the front desk. I looked at the tub, which had a slimy ring around it on the drain end and there were dead bugs in that slime. I quickly cleaned the tub so it wouldn’t be disgusting. I wish I had brought shower shoes. We all wished that. We did the best we could and then we left, with my wife leaving everything she would need in the morning to get ready for work.
On Tuesday morning, the young guy returned and finished the job. He said we’d get a bill in the mail and that we needed to get someone out to check the chimney because something must be wrong with it. He stated that there was water in there and it would cause the same problem if we didn’t get it fixed. Great. Just leave. I am so tired of you.
And then Tuesday was full of three dishwasher loads, tons of laundry to include bedding, and the best shower I’ve ever taken. I will never take hot water for granted again!
In other news, my psychiatric nurse practitioner told me today that she is retiring in June and I wasn’t sad. I don’t like her all that much and I will be fine seeing someone else 4-6 times a year. She said everyone else was really good and I was a good patient.
On the way to the hotel on Monday, Boy #2 found out he was accepted (early decision) into his first choice college. Best day ever! Shower and a college acceptance! I think it was earlier that day (or Sunday), I forget now that Boy #1 told me he’s strongly considering joining the Air Force because he’s so stressed worrying about having enough money for college. I have a lot of anxiety about all of this with him. We’ve got a lot of starting and stopping on his launch into adulthood and I’m not sure how it’s going to work out for him.
Girl asked if she could have a razor from a pack I picked up the other day. She’s ready to start shaving her legs. Rock on. We had a quick lesson on how to be careful with a razor on your skin and she took a nice, long bath to get it done. I told her go slow, don’t rush, and I’m so glad she didn’t try to keep it a secret. That’s how you get big, bad cuts. Her body, her choice. No need for us to deny that she’s growing up and feels self-conscious about hair on her legs. And her best friend is no longer friends with their other friend because she sent a picture of herself in just a bra on Snapchat. What???
A week from today I have an appointment with my doctor to start micro-dosing testosterone and I’m pretty excited about that. I’m still super happy with my surgery results and I feel like I’m getting closer and closer to exactly who I want to be. I still feel great mentally most of the time and I can’t wait to legally change my name next year. I think that’s one of the first things I plan to do early in the year.
It’s been a hell of a week and I am so glad things are settling down just in time to ramp up for the holidays. There’s so much to figure out and gifts to buy. But it will be ok. We will get through it all, just as we keep on doing. And hot water. I am still so thankful for hot water!!
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