Every person has a breaking point. Today the thing that broke me was a squeaky faucet handle. It gets worse. It started with a squeaky faucet handle, and culminated with a bathroom geyser and broken glass everywhere. Let me explain.
For a couple of years now, my bathroom faucet handle has made a horrible squeaky screech every time I use the sink. The same with two of the other faucets in the house. I asked my husband for help with this a year or more ago. He squirted a little WD-40 into the handle, which didn't fix it, declared it un-fixable and went on with his life. Meanwhile, the squeak got worse. And worse. Especially at 2:00 a.m., when the house is silent and I'm trying to use the bathroom and not disturb anyone. I have asked for help with this several times over the last year and my husband has either tuned me out or forgotten. His sink doesn't squeak, so it isn't a problem for him. I asked for help again today and again he blew me off. Here is an excerpt of my texts to my friend, Peggy, during this time period:
Me: I asked him for help with my bathroom
faucet problem and his help is he's
making himself a second breakfast.
Peggy: As all good hobbits do.
Me: Then he dragged his food upstairs and
left a trail of crumbs in the kitchen
THAT I HAD JUST CLEANED.
Peggy: Seems like he needs some kind of
reinforcing message that he may be
taking you for granted.
Me: I think only my death would reinforce
that. He did fold a little laundry,
so that was nice.
Me: I once read a story in Reader's Digest
about a woman whose husband had died
recently. She called her son to come help
her because she said her toilet was broken.
It was all dirty inside the bowl, which had
never happened in her 50+ years of
marriage. It turns out that her husband
had been cleaning the toilet all of those
years and she didn't realize it. Once he was
gone, the toilet stopped getting cleaned. She
had no idea toilets got dirty. That's me.
I'm that husband, doing things to keep the
house running that no one notices or realizes.
I include these texts because they help explain where I was mentally and why I was at the end of my rope this morning. I was feeling a little unappreciated and a lot martyr-ish and my patience was razor thin. So I decided I would fix the damn faucet myself. In retrospect, this was probably not the best time to embark on a home improvement project, especially alone. But I'd had two cups of coffee and I felt like that lady in the We Can Do It! poster, only I was more pissed off and less inspired than the woman flexing her bicep. I don't even own a headscarf. Nevertheless, I persisted.
I found the right-sized allen wrench and spray lubricant in the garage, took the faucet handle off, sprayed in the grease, and turned the faucet on and off a bunch of times to distribute the grease--but it was still squeaky. I looked it up on the internet, which told me to do exactly what I had already done. I kept reading articles, and I realized I needed to get lubricant inside a certain piece. But then I couldn't get that piece off, so I was forced to ask my husband for assistance AGAIN. This time he helped, and I went to put the next batch of clothes in the dryer. When I came back, he told me he had to turn the water valve off under the sink because water started spraying out of the top of the faucet when he tried to take that particular piece off. Cool. Noted. Now get out of my way. (I didn't actually say any of that, but I thought it.) I put lubricant in the part I previously couldn't get to, put everything back together...and the squeak was gone! Victory! Yay, me! I did it! I was so confident I decided I'd fix the other two squeaky handles in the other two bathrooms. I had my husband help with the second sink, and again I fixed the squeak! Yay! And then I decided I could do the last sink by myself.
For reasons I cannot explain, I thought I was special and that I could get the handle all taken apart without the water shooting out, and so I did not turn off the water supply under the sink. This was a mistake. Because when I tried to remove the last piece, a geyser opened up and flooded the bathroom quite dramatically. I called for help and put the hand towel over said geyser, but not before I had sprayed every wall, piece of wall art, the ceiling, light fixture, mirror, counter, floor, myself, etc. My husband ran downstairs and turned off the water supply for me. He was very unhappy with situation (and/or possibly less than thrilled with me) and angrily started trying to mop up the floor with one of the towels. I, soaked through to the skin and dripping, told him I would deal with the cleanup and asked him to go, because it was my mess. I was not phased and was kind of amused. I mean, this is not something you see every day, water dripping down all four bathroom walls with my bedraggled, wet-dog self reflecting through the drips on the mirror. Plus, it could have been so much worse, I figured! I had gotten off easy, in the grand scheme of things. I towel-mopped the floor, wiped down the dripping walls and threw a towel at the ceiling over and over to get all of the drips there. I dried off the art work and soap pump and set everything in the dining room to dry. And then I went back to my new nemesis--that bastard, the faucet.
There's a little rubber gasket that shot out with the geyser, and it was a real pain to get it back inside the inner workings of the handle. My husband had a hard time with it on the first faucet, so it was not a surprise I couldn't get it on right either. I kept testing it and turning on the water valve just a hair, and that stupid thing kept leaking. FINALLY I got all of the pieces back together, but I didn't tighten the allen screw on the handle just in case I still didn't have it on correctly. This was my next mistake. Because when I turned on the water valve ever so slightly, it turned into Old Faithful again and the faucet handle shot straight in the air. It hit the vanity light above, which exploded into glass shards all over the bathroom. There was even a little smoke, for dramatic effect, I guess. I quickly turned the valve off, but once again the mirror, light fixture and ceiling--all of which I had JUST finished drying off, mind you--were covered with water, and now there was also broken glass everywhere. At this point, I waved the white flag and asked my husband to help yet again. I may be stubborn and foolish, but I am not totally stubborn and foolish. I told him I just wanted it done and I thought I could do it myself and I was wrong. So wrong. And I cried. A lot. My kids were wandering in and out of the situation, not sure what to make of the flood, or of me. My son retreated for safer parts. My daughter kept trying to comfort me, telling me it wasn't that bad and hugging me.
The good news is, my husband felt so bad for me that he couldn't be angry anymore, and he got the faucet handle back together while I cleaned up broken glass. He also helped dry off everything. Again. A raw potato helped get the broken light bulb out of the socket (a tip I read years ago that really works!). The bathroom is probably cleaner now than it has been since we bought the house. And, let's not forget, all of the faucet handles are now squeak-free!
The moral of the story is twofold. First, sometimes it's better to work together. And don't start a project when you are fed up and little bit crazy. My husband probably thinks I am more than a little bit crazy, but he also probably (maybe) would acknowledge that he played a part in pushing me over the edge. Sidenote: If someone asks you for help and you blow them off, you might end up with a flooded bathroom covered in glass shards. So be a good helper. The second moral of the story is, if you are attempting a faucet repair, turn off the water valve first.
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| We can do it! Unless we can't. In which case, please help us. The first time we ask. |
