Water, Water, Everywhere...

I guess the universe decided that I needed a little water to go with all that sunshine I've been getting this month.

First, our hot water heater broke, flooding our (very full) basement with up to 5 inches of water in the deeper parts. Then, on a particularly rainy day, it started raining into our bedroom (which is on the 2nd floor, so no relation to the basement issue). Oh yeah, and our downstairs toilet started to leak.

The hot water heater broke when I was home between trips to CA and FL. Bob and I were going out for brunch (so, late morning) and to run errands, and as we were leaving I heard water running down in the basement. It sounded like the washing machine, and I was pretty surprised and impressed that Bob was already doing laundry that day. Fortunately, rather than just heading straight out the door, I mentioned it... and was none too happy to hear that he had not in fact started the washing machine. I rushed down there to find water spewing out of the top of the hot water heater (I later learned this was because the "core" blew, though I still don't really know what that means--other than that we were out one hot water heater, which needed to be replaced), and an ever-less-shallow lake covering the entire basement floor.

Doing my best to remain calm, I called Bob down there, and we started trying to figure out how to turn the water off. I thought I remembered the water main being on the far side of the basement, on the wall closest to the street. Not even thinking about the possibility of getting electrocuted, I trudged over there through increasingly deep water (at least I was in my rubber-soled Dansko clogs). Bob followed; while I looked for the water main, he headed straight for the hot water heater, and actually found the right spigot to turn off.

I knew there was a drain somewhere in the floor over where I was (from a previous flooding); I found it, but we couldn't get it open. Fortunately, a friend who is also a handyman was able to come over and open it up for us, and the water did drain out pretty quickly once that was the case. He's the one who brought up the possibility of electrocution. YIKES! But fortunately, we were all fine. If a little wet.

But then there was the matter of All That Stuff to deal with.

First, let me say that I am an incurable pack rat. Have been since I was a kid. I really have a hard time parting with things--not like those people on tv who save the wrapper that their Big Mac came in, or anything. But really, I know I save way too many things. I envy my sister, whose house is, I would venture to say, about 100% clutter-free. I don't know how she does it.

Anyway... all of that to say that my basement would have had way too much stuff in it anyway, but it had even more because last year when we renovated the attic for Bob I lost all of my storage space up there. I did get rid of some stuff, but a lot of it ended up in the basement. And then there were the many boxes of Bob's things that we hadn't found a place for that were also on the floor in there. Plus boxes of things from our wedding (extra embossed napkins, which I thought would be fun to save and break out at an anniversary party somewhere down the line, etc.). And of course, a TON of toys, because before that became our storage room it was George's playroom.

So began the task of going through all of it. Which was a task we were planning to undertake this winter anyway, to get the house more organized before the baby joins us and we start acquiring even more stuff. But this wasn't exactly how we were hoping to go about it! Also, I really couldn't start right away, because I was quite exhausted from my trip *and* I needed to save my energy for a 4-hour gig we had the next day. (The two-hour gig we had in the middle of the holidays just about did me in, because I wasn't well rested for it. It took me days to recover, and I didn't have days to recover from this one because George and I were going to be off on our next adventure very soon.) And Bob couldn't do it without me, because honestly, it was mostly my stuff. It was completely overwhelming.

But, you know what? As overwhelmed as I felt by the monumental task of sorting through all of it (and the short time frame), and by knowing that I was going to have to part with a lot of stuff (which, as I said, is not something I do very willingly), I actually didn't really feel all that upset. In fact, I was feeling, overall, blessed and even lucky.

Why? Because this all happened at the same time as the earthquake in Haiti.

I couldn't bring myself to watch much coverage of the devastation there, but you really couldn't help but be aware of it. Thinking of all of those people trapped in the rubble of their homes, or wandering around looking for loved ones, with no shelter and no food and in many cases in need of medical attention.... What, compared to that, were a few dozen boxes of wet stuff that I hadn't seemed to miss much in the last year anyway??? Not a whole heck of a lot. I really felt that, and it really gave me the strength to do what needed to be done.

So after I'd made it through and recovered from the gig (which went surprisingly well: a 4-hour gig when you're well rested is infinitely easier than a 2-hour gig when you're not, I found), Bob and I headed down there to attack the mess. It was a little bit brutal, I won't deny. One thing that stands out in particular that was tough to toss was the original trunk (it looked like a big, black suitcase) from my dad's very, very old Ford, which had a note with it that my dad had written about it sometime before he died. The fact that it was soaking wet might've been ok, but it had started to mold a little bit and the whole thing smelled bad. Bob thought that maybe we could salvage it, but I didn't see how, and besides, I was in a rare mode of being willing to get rid of things. So I saved the note, but out went the trunk. Along with a ton of clothes, books, papers, supplies, some stuffed animals, a beautiful (thick and quite large) area rug, and I don't-really-want-to-think-of-what-all-else. I actually felt really bad throwing clothes away, but they were soaking wet and would have needed to be cleaned before being donated, and I truly did not have it in me wash or dry clean them all. It might have been different if I hadn't been leaving town again the next day, or if I hadn't been pregnant and running on limited energy anyway (or if we hadn't also had to do about 8 loads of laundry because we had mounds of it down there that had been waiting to be either washed or folded), but there you have it--that's all I could handle.

We put bags and bags and boxes of things out by the side of the house, for Bob to haul to the curb on garbage day after I was long gone.

There are big spots of mold on the floor that will need to be dealt with, and that aren't getting any smaller, but they will just have to wait.

Focusing on the positive. I'm trying to retain that sense of feeling blessed and lucky for how wonderful my life really is overall.... We really do have so very much. And feeling good about finally having just a little bit less!