Monthly Archives: October 2015

Can Do Attitude

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A year or two ago my sister-in-law described me as having a Can Do attitude. I liked that. Made me strut a little. When you are coping alone with an old house and its problems, it is good to think you can do it.

But since the beginning of the new year, i think that attitude was flagging a bit. It has been a tough year in terms of home repairs, and the slow recovery from my knee surgery had an impact, too. I felt more inclined to call on others for help which is not necessarily a bad thing. And maybe I was becoming more realistic about what I could do.

So I am feeling a bit puffed up today over my success in replacing the leaking hose for my pull-out Blanco kitchen faucet. When I discovered the puddle inside the kitchen cabinet Wednesday night and identified that the hose was leaking every time I turned on the faucet, I simply sighed, went into the study, and in my Daytimer wrote down the first task for Thursday morning: Call the Plumber.

But the next day I thought maybe I should see how hard it would be to make the repair myself. On YouTube I found a video made by Blanco detailing step by step how to replace the faucet hose. To order the replacement part, they gave an e-mail address and a phone number. I pulled out the accordion folder holding all the information about the home improvements we had made to the house over the years, found the Blanco faucet description, and sent an e-mail to Blanco. They replied asking for my shipping address. That was Thursday.

Today is Saturday, and the replacement hose was in my mailbox. Hoorah for Blanco customer service! I watched the video again and then followed the steps: turn off the cold and hot water and undo the hose under the sink. I struggled to disconnect the flexible metal hose, finally resorting to a pliers. Darned thing would not turn. Just as I was ready to give up, the connection loosened. The spray head  was easy to disconnect from the hose, but pulling the hose out of the opening took a lot of wiggling and coaxing. Putting the new hose on was easy, and when I turned the water back on there were no leaks.

This was not a difficult repair but it lifted my spirits. I guess my Can Do attitude is still there.

Worrying

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Bill and I used to divide the worrying. He would worry about the big things such as international events and I would worry about family and friends. When he was diagnosed with cancer, we both worried about his cancer. At least, I know I did. He did not worry visibly.

Now that he is gone, I do all the worrying. Right now I am worrying about my swimming pool which I had renovated beginning on September 4th. It was a large and complicated project involving replacing the tile at the water line, installing a new main drain, replacing the two underwater lights, and applying a new exposed pebble finish to the old plaster. I watched and worried throughout the project, remembering the problems Bill and I had when the pool was built twenty years ago: the electrical wires that were not installed in conduit per the contract and that had to be dug out and redone; the stone coping that suddenly switched from large rocks to small rocks and had to be chipped out and replace with more large stones. This fall the masons cut a large hole down through the concrete right to the dirt to make a space for the new rectangular main drain (a safety feature.) I watched with apprehension and went to bed worrying. Would the pool be water tight now?

Finally the day came for the new finish to be applied to the bottom and sides of the pool. It looked navy blue. Was that going to be the color of the pool, I worried? The following day the crew returned and with a power washer and acid scoured off the top layer of cement to reveal the shiny black pebbles and tiny glass beads of blue and bits of white shells. It was beautiful and while the water truck filled the pool with water, I relaxed and smiled. The project was finished.

But the next day I noticed white blotches on the bottom of the pool, in the shallow end. That was four weeks ago, and the pool company still is trying to figure out what is wrong and how to fix it. I am upset and angry and I worry a lot. One of my friends told me not to worry, but it is hard not to, particularly when I have to go down to the pool and brush it twice a day and check the water balance.

So I have come up with a technique which seems to be helping. Every time I start to worry about the pool, I imagine a very large clear balloon and I put the pool inside that balloon, then cut the string and watch it float away.

There are a lot of those balloons out there right now; take a look and maybe you will see one.