Crazy Thursday!

    When I climbed out of bed last Thursday morning, I had no idea that the race was on. I'm not talking Nascar here. I'm talking my own personal "get moving!" kind of day.
     My husband is having work done on a rental property he owns. It's a double and it's sat for 3 years - unoccupied. In that time, the pipes have frozen. He has people working to get the units ready for easy living. So of course, there must be plumbing. 
     When I arrived in Anderson, I called my husband to remind him that he needed to turn off the water filter spigot - as by now, 25 minutes later - it had finished filling the tea kettle. ( This is a long story that I will not go into but will just point out that the spigot runs the filtered water out so slow that a person is likely to die of thirst before they get a 8 ounce tumbler of water.) Well, I could not get my husband (we'll call him... Phil) on the line. I left a dozen messages on his cell phone and our house phone.
Then my phone rings from a phone number that I've never seen before. I answer. It's Wayne - the plumber, working at the rental.
     He starts "Phil wanted me to call you and have you call around and find out where we can get some crimp rings."
I asked, "You just talked to Phil?" 
Wayne answers "Yeah."
"Where is he?" I asked.
     To make a long story shorter, Wayne didn't know Phil's current location. Wayne was at the rental, needing plumbing parts. Wayne started reading off a list of items he needed for the job (by now you must realize that Wayne is not a "professional" plumber). So I ended up going to the rental to pick up Wayne to take him shopping for the parts. As we were leaving the hardware store, I asked if there were any other parts needed for the job. "No, we should be fine now."
     Well, 4 more trips to the hardware store for parts, it's coming to the end of the work day and we still didn't have the water running correctly at the rental.
     Then I  got a phone call from Dave, another worker at the rental, who asks if Wayne was coming back (Wayne had to leave early for a job interview) because the kitchen sink is leaking water underneath the cabinet. I told him that I would come over there because I had been informed by Wayne that several of the parts would have to be returned and some new ones would need to be purchased. So I would pick them up and check the leak situation.
     I arrived at the house around 4 o clock. The sack of parts to be returned were sitting on the sink. Dave pointed out the leaking pipes. I asked if there wasn't a cut off valve some where nearby. He said he had tightened it down as far as it would go. He was afraid to tighten it further as it might do damage to the valve.
     I looked at him with wide eyed curiosity and asked the lethal question. "Isn't there a main valve that cuts the water off to the entire property?"
    He looked at me like I had run him through with a switch blade. "Yeah, it's under the house...in the crawlspace."
     "Well, I guess we'll need to turn it off there." I offered.
      At 4 o clock in the afternoon, when a person is gearing down to end the work day, this is not the statement that wins "Employer of the Year" for anyone. Of course him mumbling "I guess I have no choice" as he yanks his coveralls out of the back of his truck, won't get him "Employee of the Year" either.

I did want to mention something I experienced last Thursday. As Wayne the plumber and I were heading to the hardware store, he mentioned that he had had his hand cut off in a weird sheet metal accident. I looked at him in amazement because both his hands were still attached. He showed me his right hand. His wrist looked a little knobby and there was a scar across his arm at the wrist. Wayne lives within walking distance to Phil's rental so he'd brought a notebook to work to show Dave and Richard pictures of his lost hand and the miracle of what he endured. When we came back to the rental, he showed me the notebook. As I started to open it, Dave said "you're likely to lose your lunch over those pictures."  Yet, I found myself intrigued. One pictures showed his arm and the sliced flesh at his wrist area. It was no grosser than the cuts of meat you might see in the meat section of a grocery. There was no gushing blood. Just this arm missing a hand. And the other pictures were of his lost hand. His right hand lay on a blue towel. It just lay there. I was reminded of a swan sailing across blue water....such a miracle is a hand....those fingers....the potential. I lay the notebook down and looked at his hand, now back with it's arm. Tears came to my eyes. Here he was with his hand and his fingers and the potential that this combination can bring about. It was an awesome thing to contemplate.
   OK, here's my last Crazy Thursday story. I got home around 6 o clock. Phil was home, working on the computer. I had managed to speak with him a couple of times during the day. For some reason we kept getting a bad connection and his voice was all computer-robotized, so our conversations were short but loud.
He worked a while longer on the computer then told me he was going outside to do some garden work. I told him to keep an eye on Daisy, our dog. She loves to be outside but she also loves to follow any of our neighbors who happen to be walking along the road. Phil said he'd watch her. I decided to start dinner. At a certain point, I  needed to go to the bathroom. Our only bathroom sits about 5 foot from our front door. As things were progressing, I heard a knock on the front door. I figured it was Phil and that he was locked out. So I yell out "Just a minute! I'm on the toilet!" (in a voice that had a touch of total irritation in it.)
     When I finished, I took my sweet time washing up then I stepped to the front door and jerked it open. Before me stood 2 people that I have never seen before. A man in a tee shirt and tan shorts, who just looked down at his hands - maybe checking for a hang nail. And a woman who was dressed in an ankle length,flowing, orange sun dress. She reminded me of pictures I'd seen of the Woodstock Music Festival.

   She smiles sweetly and says "Your dog was following us." And we all three look down at Daisy -my dog- who the hippie lady was holding by the collar. Daisy seemed to have little care that she had brought humiliation to me once again. All I could say was "thanks." Neither one of them said a word, just handed off the dog, turned in unison and walked away... her orange dress fluttering in the breeze.  Awkward.

Here it is, your moment of zen.