Nothing lasts forever, despite the Liberty Mutual ads' claims to the contrary. My house proved this to be true over the weekend.
The pool is dead. The entire control panel is dark. There's no filtering, no heating (not that we need it when the temperature is triple digits boiling melting sweat dripping hot), and no circulation. The detritus blown in by the ferocious storm last night is drifting lazily on the surface. There's no gentle current from the machinery to waft it all toward the filter.
TBG says it's not safe to swim - bugs and disease and stuff - and while I disagree with his assessment of the situation, I'm staying inside in the air conditioning because it's just too damn hot out there, even for swimming.
One of the overhead outdoor ceiling lights shed its cover. There were pieces of cross-hatched glass all over the ground when I went out with the laundry and the drying rack. The light is still in the fixture, uncovered but still shining. How this came to be remains a mystery. TBG thinks it might be lightning from last night's storm, but how the strike could have gotten under the overhang is incomprehensible to me.
All we know is that there was glass on the ground and the offending lightbulb is seated higher than our tallest ladder..
Sweeping in triple digits is not fun. We tag teamed the chore, one of us pushing the big yellow outdoor broom, the other peering closely, looking for random slivers that will cut our bare feet if we can ever use the pool again. Then we switched jobs, because he kept missing little pieces, insisting that they were white spots, not glass, although I saw them glistening in the sunlight and knew they were sharp.
I communed with my parents as I used the dust pan I inherited from them.
We turned all the knobs we understand on the pool's control panel. We flipped all the circuit breakers we thought might influence the machinery. We swore. We sweated.
TBG called the pool guy; I refused to bother him on Sunday.
There are a bunch of old movies we want to watch. I have 7 books yet to open from the library. There is laundry to be washed and folded and groceries to be purchased and cooked. It's really too hot to enjoy swimming.
Why am I sitting here moaning about the fact that I can't use my pool?
I hate it when things break and we don't know how to fix them.
There's no reason for me to be anxiety ridden.
And yet, I am.
Well, bummer.
ReplyDeleteOur AC, which we hardly ever need, went out last year when we had our freak triple digit heat wave. It got fixed after the heat was over.
How do these appliances know just when to conk out??
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Okay . . . too hot for swimming? But I thought swimming was for cooling off when it's hot? This is a Vermonter question!
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to cool off when the water is 92 degrees and the outdoor temperature is 111. And there's no breeze. Nor any clouds . It gets down to the high 80's at night, so the water never cools off. I was surprised by it, too.
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The anxiety is age-related. When we were younger, we would have gotten everything cleaned up, repaired, and moved on because there were too many other things, like jobs and childcare, to to occupy our time. The minor inconveniences of our youth have not become big honking problems in old age. I don't understand this. It annoys me. But I get so frustrated and anxious when things go awry. I have to talk myself down. Our dishwasher is the current problem. We have the new dishwasher. Sitting in the garage. The old leaking dishwasher was hauled away. But the floor under that dishwasher was water-logged and the new one cannot be installed until the floor dries out. So, a fan blows around the clock to speed up the drying. The grandkids are here this week. We are using more dishes that all need now to be hand washed. I also have to fix meals. It raises my anxiety.
ReplyDeleteOh, honey, use disposables! I am certain that you recycle everything always forever but this is an emergency!! I grant you grace and permission to enjoy your grandbabies and not spend your time washing dishes.
DeleteOur dishwasher died Xmas Eve 2020. I feel your pain.
It's existential.... our time is limited and we don't want to spend it with broken stuff..
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