The Longest Night of The Year
As we head into the last two weeks of this year, we have Christmas and then a few short days later we are hosting a wedding. We have company coming for the holiday and then more arriving for the wedding. Our checklist contains things that need to be done. organized, shopped for, checked off or checked on.
We are binge watching a Netflix series on Sunday night because it’s cold and we’ve got a lot to do this week. As the evening goes on we realize that the house is getting colder and colder. This is going to be the coldest night of the year, the coldest night of many years, and our heat has gone out. Cue the fireplace. The fireplace that has a huge tv (the one we are currently watching) in front of it. We have a frenzy of moving cords and wires and we somehow manage to get the tv moved and a fire going.
It’s harder to use a fire as the primary heat source than I remember. It involves sleeping right next to the fire and stoking it during the night. I have to make a freezing trip to get more firewood in the middle of the night because it has consumed so much wood trying to keep us warm. Needless to say, no one has a good night’s rest.
When I turn on the faucet and there’s no water I can only laugh (slightly hysterically). The lightbulb that stays on in the well house has burned out (on the coldest night of the year) and our pipes are frozen. (Add a light bulb to the checklist) I bundle up and watch the clock until 8 am and start making phone calls. The heat man will be here before noon and the well man can’t get here until late afternoon. In spite of all the checklists, I simply cannot focus on anything but no heat and no water. This day is going to be spent playing the waiting game.
The heat man easily replaces a part and we have heat before noon. The pipes thaw when the sun comes out and we have water. Sanity is restored and I return to my checklist ready to play catch-up.
As I head to my car I hear a funny noise from the back of the house. I round the corner of the house to see a giant fountain at the back of our pool. My mind takes awhile to register what the huge spray of water actually is, and by the time I can wrestle breakers and valves, the pool has drained down a few feet of water. It appears that we’ve had a pipe freeze on the pool pump too.
So I end this day without leaving the house. I don’t mark anything off my checklist. I feel like I haven’t accomplished anything.
All I can do is embrace the chaos, slow down and reset. I think I got all three of my disasters covered today so I know that tomorrow will be great! And tomorrow, I will add the pool man to my checklist….
