Mothering a Two-Year-Old: The Faucet

Can I just say I love being a stay at home mom? I don’t have to get up until my son does (this normally occurs around 7:30 or 8 am). If I don’t want to get dressed, I don’t have to. Typically I get him out of bed, feed the both of us breakfast, and then lock us in his room for a couple hours while I read and drink my coffee and he plays. It’s a great routine really. At least, it is normally. The other day however was a completely different story.

--------------------

I was smack dab in the middle of book 11 (yes the series is that long) the morning my life exploded.
“Potty? Poopy in the potty?” (We’re in potty training mode, remember?). I take him to the bathroom and help him off with his “guysonaur” pants (yes, this is how my son pronounces dinosaur). He sits, but he doesn’t go, so I let him up then I turn to wash my hands in the sink.

And all hell breaks loose….

For as I attempt to turn the water off, I can feel something in the knob slip and the water continues it’s flow. But I’m the mom, and what I say goes, dangit! So I try to turn it just a little bit more – to no avail. I attempt to over-turn it hoping to re-adjust whatever it was that slipped – to no avail.
I get pliers and try to crank harder - to no avail. It’s actually gotten worse!

I slowly begin to panic when I realize there is no emergency shut off valves for this sink. This calls for drastic measures. I call the landlord.
“Mr. Fox? Where is the emergency water shut off for the house?”
“Uh.. That’s a good question. I really don’t know. Try taking the knob off the faucet.”

It’s at this point I decide to “lock” my son in his room. We’ve recently installed one of those ever so clever baby-proof-no-goof-door-kn
ob-covers to help deter him from his latest habit – getting up at all hours of the morning and ever so quietly opening the door to his room and doing everything he’s not supposed to (like play with the computer and help himself to the butter knives). That done I pound on the faucet with the end of my crescent wrench, crack the top open, find the screw and remove the knob. Sure enough, cranking on the parts underneath continues to make it worse. And now I’ve got a leak going underneath the sink!

I find the water meter outside and a second covered tube nearby. Sure enough, I find a water spicket type knob inside. It takes a wrench and a screwdriver, but I finally get this silly thing to turn on, but not off and many trips in and out of the house tells me nothing is happening inside.
“Mr. Fox, it’s not working.”
“Must be for the sprinklers,” (which don’t work by the way, and this doesn’t help me at the moment.) “Try looking under the house.”

My pastor is the only “handyman” I can think of that might be able to drop what he’s doing and come rescue me – but he still isn’t answering his phone, so I call my friends John and Renna.
“Uh, I’m having a problem, can you guys help me?”
“What kind of problem?”
“The ‘how-fast-can-you-get-here?’ kind…”
Pause and low muffled talking.
“We’re on our way.”

Under the house? Are you serious? I’m in a skirt and a tank top with no bra! Rifling through my closet I remedy the bra problem, throw on an old pair of jeans I don’t wear any more, a holey T-shirt, and a bandanna to keep my messy bed head out of my face. Then I head outside thinking to make one last ditch effort at cranking the spicket thing before I attempt to go make friends with the mud, mice, and spiders under my home.

Up to this point my son has been yelling at me every time he hears my tear past his room. “Let me out! Let me out!” Sorry kid. Mama’s a little stressed out and dangerous with metal tools. But something has changed. “POOPY IN THE POTTY!!!!!”

In a fantastic display of absolute self control over the situation, I throw open the door to my son’s room and usher him into the bathroom, which is now in utter chaos - water gushing, tools lying on the sink, a broken faucet knob, and all the cleaning supplies littering the floor to make room for the trash can that’s catching the leak.

It’s too late, however, he’s already pooped in his pants. I throw him in the tub - poop, “guysonaur” pants and all - and leave him there.

Now, I’m a good, modest, Christian lady who normally doesn’t walk around informing the world of the junk in my trunk, or letting myself flop on top. However, putting on those jeans from my closet reminds me why I ceased wearing them. There is a massive hole in the butt, in just the right spot so you can see my butt cheek hanging out of my underwear. But darn it I’m going to fix this problem and if 4 or 5 dozen strangers at the church across the street see my cheeky little rear end I don’t care a whit!
Back outside and baring all to the neighbors, I still can’t get the knob to turn and it seems there is no other valves outside. Despairing, I head inside to clean up my kid. I wash him up and just as I’m getting him out of the tub, John and Renna arrive with their little girl Evie.

--------------------

I can just see how it went down from their point of view.

John- “Ok, let’s go see what we can do for her. It can’t be that bad.”
They get out of the car and walk up to the house.
Renna- “Whoa!”

Because this is what they see.

The house is a mess. There is laundry and toys scattered across the living room. There is laundry and toys scattered in the kitchen. Dirty dishes are piled sky high. My terrific two-year-old is running around screaming, completely naked, blonde hair sticking up in every direction. Water can be heard running in the bathroom where you can just see through the door way all the tools and cleaning supplies littering the floor. And there stands their good friend - hair half braided from the night before and wisps flying everywhere and running wildly out from under her tan bandanna because she has yet to brush it (or her teeth for that matter). Modest Mom’s rear end is hanging out of her jeans (a side of her they’ve never seen up till now), her makeup is trying to make it’s escape from her face, convince that working 24 hours of overtime is inconsistent with its contract , and her bright yellow holey shirt from junior high with it’s bright purple sunflower-smiley face is unknowingly on backwards.

“Help me,” I mutter.

--------------------

My landlord finally had to call the city to shut off the water. While we waited the two hours for them to show up we checked again for a shut off valve, and I discovered something; Murphy’s Law really is out to get me. Of all the water sources in my ENTIRE house – the toilets, the master bathroom sink, the kitchen sink, the washer, the hot water heater, the dish washer – the ONLY one in the house with no emergency shut off valve is the one that decided it had had enough. I took an emergency trip to Home Depot (after changing my jeans and turning my shirt the right way) and spent the rest of the day replacing the faucet, the drain, the water hoses, and installing shut off valves! I even had to saw off the old drain to get it to come out!

All in all, I have to say just one thing.
I love being a stay at home mom.