The People Are Like A Flood

The problem with owning your own home is that you are the one who is ultimately responsible for things. As you may know about me, I don't wanna be responsible.

This morning we had an appointment to have our main water valve switched out for a newer model. We had been told, by two seperate people, that the old one might not actually do the trick if we ever needed to, in an emergency, switch off our water. Since we had that flood a few months ago, I'm very aware of the dangers of water. So we made this appointment.

The plan was that at 8:00 the city water guys would come over and shut off our water from the valve at the end of the driveway. Then at 8:15, the plumber would arrive to switch out the valve in our basement.

At 7:30 I was just getting out of the shower when the city guys showed up. I had had a hunch that they would be early so I luckily, got in the shower early. These guys love to do things early in the morning and the water department building is literally right next door to us. I guess the plumber had a similar hunch. He arrived at a little before 8:00.

So he came in and did his thing, then he waited for the city guys to come back and switch back on the feed from the street. They eventually did and he checked to make sure that everything seemed kosher. I said, "Looks good? No dripping or anything?". He said yes and left.

Our water meter and valve is in a hard-to-reach place beneath our basement stairs. After he was gone I crawled in there with a flashlight to take a look. The ground was wet all around the new valve. I assume that it is just left over from when he made the switch. I assume when I get home later tonight it'll be all dried up. However, there is a gnawing part of me that says, there's a leak, it's getting bigger, and your new post-flood-repaired basement is currently filling up with water, your new carpets are being destroyed, your new drywall is getting wet etc. That part of me really wants to jump up and run back home and check on the situation.

Why? Because it all comes down to me and Lesa. There's no landlord to check it out. There's nobody in charge but us. I trust the plumber. I like him, he's done other work for us. But things happen and it seems that anytime anybody does any kind of home construction work, something somewhere goes awry.

I listened to Nick Drake on my way to town today to try and calm myself down, to ease out the nagging in my gut. I think I was traumatized by our last flood. I've become terribly paranoid about water. I was thinking how lucky home owners were on the west coast since a lot of them have no basement.

Sometimes I wish there was a landlord to blame.