I woke up before the rest of the family this morning. I fed the dogs, let them out, watered the plants… my usual morning routine. And it was so quiet and peaceful that I took a moment to sit in my comfy chair and just breathe. I thought about yesterday and I was overwhelmed with gratitude. It had been a great day. We took some friends out on the boat. We enjoyed the sunshine and the water and some laughs. We came home early to host a small family get-together to celebrate Jack’s birthday. All the kids were there. That, in and of itself, was a blessing. We had a delicious meal and birthday cake and some more laughs. Be a spent the night. Lee had a couple friends sleep over. So I sat there, breathing deeply, smiling at the fact that my house is full of sleeping teenagers. Bliss.
This evening, we’re headed to a concert with some friends. And the plan for today is simply to relax. Read. Write. Crochet. Maybe make a big breakfast. Oooh. Breakfast. That’s a good idea. Let me go downstairs to the big freezer and see if we have some bacon for these kids. So I took my bare feet and my gratitude into the basement.
Squish. My naked right foot met a splashy sponge of carpet at the bottom of the stairs. Dammit. My blissful moment of gratitude was interrupted.
I took stock of the situation. The laundry room was flooded. The water was seeping into the garage. Half of the carpet in the finished basement was soaked. I didn’t even make it to the freezer to check for bacon.
And then, like the self-sufficient, independent woman I am, I walked right back up the stairs.
“Jack? Honey? We’ve got a problem.”
He pulled himself out of bed and we both went to assess the damage. I slipped into my rain boots and rubber gloves and broke out the mop and the wet vac. He checked the washing machine and then the sink and finally, the main drain from the house. Bingo. That main drain clogged once before… five years ago. The guy told us we’d probably have to do it again in about five years. I should have marked my calendar.
The good news is we know what the problem is. The bad news is that this isn’t clean water. It’s really gross, dirty water.
Jack went out to his truck for his tools. He blasted the drain and had me run the water again. Problem solved. For now. We know it’s a temporary solution, but at least we can run the water again.
And then, as the two of us bleached and vacuumed and mopped and scrubbed, I told him how the morning had started.
All of that gratitude and peace. And yeah, maybe it didn’t turn out to be the peaceful, quiet morning that I expected.
But that gratitude? That just got magnified. I’m so grateful for a husband who knows how to blast a pipe. I’m grateful to be married to a man who can handle literal crap without losing his crap. I’m so thankful to love a man who will roll out of bed, roll up his sleeves, and face the hard stuff with me. And I’m grateful that we can still manage to laugh together through the yucky stuff.
Turns out, we did have bacon in the freezer. And I’m grateful for that, too.