Thursday, August 11, 2005

How Dry I Am

It's now been 2+ weeks since Noah built his playground in my basement. After all of the water removal (three times, but who's counting? Oh yeah..I WAS) we waved goodbye to not one, but two dumpsters full of wet, stinky nastiness. There is still much work left to be done, but I feel a wee bit optimistic that someday there will be light at the end of the tunnel.

Family, friends and even strangers have been incredibly helpful and supportive. I like to talk about being a "big tough girl" -- but I don't think I could have ever gotten that ping-pong table out of my basement. The same goes for the two very large and very heavy filing cabinets. Thanks to Big Brother Tuna and The Boy, they didn't seem to pose a problem that a couple of beers and Mike's Hard Lemonade couldn't solve. BBTuna was first on the scene that fateful "we have no power and I'm a sweatball" afternoon, wading through water and helping us to carry things out. BSTuna came out later in the week armed with plastic laundry baskets and real food, which (according to the pop cup count in my sink) we hadn't bothered with in nearly a week. She lugged and toted and helped us make amazing progress. She also brought (and left behind as a temporary good-luck charm) the all important Voodoo Monkey. So far -- so good!

Everywhere I went -- even to the far reaches of the middle of nowhere in the mitten -- I found much understand and sympathy. It seems having a leaky basement makes you a part of the brethren, and I heard tales of woe and horror that rivaled childbirth and standardized tests. Now that I'm a member of the flood-club, I get to tell my story as well. It's one of the perks.

As I hauled load after load out of the basement, it became painfully clear that like Jacob Marley's chains, I have been bogged down with STUFF for far too long. So over the next few weeks my hardest job will be figuring out what is important to me, while trying to remember that who I am is not defined by what I have*.

Wish me luck!


*All fiber-related crafts and music exempt. Just thought I should clarify.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

My general rule with STUFF is that if it hasn't been opened or used in two years, chances are it's not that important.

Fuzzy disagrees, of course.

Jay Ann Cox, PhD said...

I had a flood once. Not Nature's doing. It was the idiot maint. man who didn't heed my warning that the floor seal on the toilet was bad.

Raw sewage backed up into my house, for hours, soaking a number of the not-so-hot graduate school books, the carpet and some clothes in the closet.

It was awful. Thank goddess for renter's insurance. Welcome to the Flood Club.