Mechanically, I am a total moron. I couldn’t fix a race. When something stops working, I throw it away. In a word, I am inept, inexpert, and maladroit. Okay, that’s three words. In the vernacular, at any rate, I am ALL THUMBS. Lucky for me I live in a town where I am surrounded by men who can fix anything. And tools?! Do they have tools! Plus all the neat stuff with big tires: backhoes, plows, tractors.
My tools have always been more portable: pens, paper, my keyboard, and a bit of verbal facility. These swell tools are no good, however, when a water pipe goes awry, as one of mine recently did. Out in the yard, a pipe that is a watering source protrudes about four feet out of the ground with a control handle and a hose connection at the end. Last winter at about this same time the severe cold caused the supposedly freeze-immune iron faucet to crack, spewing water all over the place. I made a phone call. Within 30 minutes, I had three neighbors there fixing it for me. I stood there awestruck; they knew just what to do, sort of like when, years ago, someone would have called me from the local jail to say “Help! Get me out of here!” I would have known what to do.
So now, almost to the day one year later, the same pipe goes kerflooey and water is spewing like crazy. Last night, the temperature about 34 degrees and the beginning of a snowfall swirling in the air, my neighbor rescued me. He was expert. He knew exactly what to do and had the equipment with which to do it. Since the thing had been throwing water out for several days, it was surrounded with mud and ice. We had to dig down about four feet to get to the point where the pipe was connected to the water system, disconnect it, then connect in its stead another pipe that my neighbor just happened to have, complete with the faucet contraption on the end. As he headed home with my profuse gratitude, the poor guy was covered in mud and freezing cold.
Now it’s the day before Xmas, the snow is coming down, it’s still 34 degrees out, and Mrs. LooseRobes is baking brownies for our handy and wonderful neighbor. A merry, merry to you all!