[Author’s Note: This is another story about poop. I write many of them. (A Tale of Two Poopies, Colorado Mom, Poop Goes *IN* the Potty, etc.) If you’re squeamish, you should skip this story, and all those other ones too.]
The second week in February 2021 wasn’t super great for us. On Sunday, I miscarried our third child, Occidentalis. On Tuesday, Australis climbed out of her crib and kicked off the events of All’s Well That Sleeps Well. And on Thursday, our basement bathroom flooded with sewage. It was a [literally] poopy conclusion to a [metaphorically] poopy week.
Here’s what happened. It was the Thursday before Presidents’ Day, and our basement tenants had already left for the weekend. Thus, it was with great consternation that I jogged downstairs mid-afternoon and discovered water underfoot. Except, it wasn’t just water. [Hint: It was poop, too.]
This was a situation for which I was ill-equipped. I was still exhausted from the events of the week, and my mind was preoccupied with planning our very busy weekend ahead. The only thing going for me was that both kids were still napping — although their waking was imminent.
Thus hindered, my first instinct was to call Taylor — but, he didn’t pick up, so I left a frantic voicemail. My next instinct was to call a plumbing company — but when dispatch answered, they informed me that, since I was a renter, I’d need to have my landlord call instead.
And, of course, when I called my landlord, it rang through to voicemail. I hung up and immediately dialed his wife, whose contact info had somehow found its way into my phone. I held my breath as the seconds passed — but, once again, the call rang through to voicemail.
This time, however, I steeled my resolve and left a slightly-less-frantic voicemail explaining the situation. I pleaded with her to call the plumbing company and resolve this disaster as soon as possible.
I glanced at the clock. No time left in the kids’ nap: the basement would have to wait.
Taylor finally called back and assured me that he was on his way home. (A flood, of all things, surely qualifies as an emergency.) When he arrived, he got straight to work wet-vacuuming the sewage from the basement floor, while I fed the kids and kept Bo from flushing his pee.
Shortly thereafter, our normal Thursday babysitter arrived at our house. Quite reasonably, she was confused to be told that no, we wouldn’t be going to Life Group, but yes, we still needed her to watch our kids. To her credit, though, she didn’t even flinch when I told her of our stomach-turning plans for the evening. Thankfully, my landlord’s wife had already called back and reluctantly agreed to approve a plumber, so our cleaning work would not be in vain.
Later — after several hours of wet-vacuuming, a quick shower, and a change of clothes — I released our babysitter and thanked her for watching our children during such a harrowing ordeal. I put the kids to bed and waited for the plumber to arrive — which, eventually, he did.
Before he went to work, we told him what we knew of the situation: that our house was built during the post-World War II housing boom, and as such, its sewer mainline was Orangeburg pipe — which is essentially just rolled-up newspaper coated in tar. If you think that sounds like a recipe for disaster — you’re right. Even the plumber agreed.
“Wow, Orangeburg?” he confirmed, his eyebrows shooting up. “Man, I didn’t realize that any of that stuff was left around here! It has to be what — fifty or sixty years old?”
Taylor and I shared an uncomfortable glance. “Actually, almost seventy.”
The plumber whistled. “Y’all are lucky. I am shocked that this mainline hasn’t fully collapsed before now. Orangeburg only has a lifespan of fifty years, max.” Casually stretching his shoulders, he announced, “Alrighty, let’s go take a look.”
He stomped downstairs to unclog, then scope, the sewer mainline. Taylor, of course, went to watch.
When they returned upstairs, I asked the plumber, “So what’s the prognosis?”
He sighed. “Well, it’s only going to get more expensive.”
That answer caught me off-guard. “What?”
He laughed. “The Orangeburg is a ticking time bomb. It’s never going to get better — it will only get worse, and more prone to clogs.”
“Wait — so what exactly happened?”
“The mainline is basically Swiss cheese. It doesn’t provide any protection against infiltration, at all — so when a tree root grows through it, then it’s likely that anything insoluble will get caught, and that can easily turn into a clog. Toilet paper is often the problem, since it doesn’t break down immediately.”
“Well, at least we don’t use any of that,” I muttered sardonically.
The plumber smirked, then continued. “Anyway, when the pipe clogs, then the water just flows into the surrounding dirt — since that’s less resistance than pushing through the clog. The water softens the dirt, and sometimes that makes it collapse into the mainline, which totally blocks the flow. It looks like that’s what happened here. I had to push through a ton of dirt to unclog the pipe — but there’s so many holes in that thing, it’s just a matter of time before it happens again.”
Taylor and I shared another uncomfortable glance. I had a feeling that some of those holes, at least, were due to us — from years before, when Taylor had snaked the toilet after a [much less severe] sewage backup. But, that had been before we knew that the mainline was Orangeburg, and before we could picture the snake’s bit shredding through its delicate tar paper.
I cleared my throat in the silence. “Um, so the City of Golden came out and replaced the water and sewage lines for our road this past year, and that’s when we found out about the Orangeburg. But, they told us that they replaced it with PVC up to the property line?”
The plumber nodded. “Yeah, they really did you a solid there. Getting the road torn up is way more expensive, so they saved your landlord a ton of money.”
I clenched my teeth. “So how much would this cost, then?”
The plumber quoted a number in the low five-digits. It was less than I expected, but more, I feared, than our landlord would hasten to pay.
“I don’t know if he’ll go for that,” I mumbled.
The plumber scoffed. “He has to. He’s your landlord.”
“It’s complicated,” Taylor answered.
And, he was right.
At first, I was hopeful that our landlord would immediately fix the mainline. After the wet-vacuuming, laundry, and sanitizing that followed the flood, I was none too eager to repeat the ordeal. And so, for weeks, I returned to peak-pandemic toilet paper conservation and held my breath every time I flushed. We stopped putting anything down the garbage disposal, and we didn’t even think about using flushable wipes.
But months passed with no change — either from our landlord or the sewer mainline. Our toilet paper usage increased as we potty-trained Australis, and I stopped preemptively praying every time I walked downstairs. Indeed, for a while, it seemed that the seventieth year of this mainline’s existence would be no different from the first. At the very least, our basement tenants voiced no complaints. (About the bathroom, at least.)
Those tenants moved out in early September, and for the first time, our family was totally alone in the house. However, because we all live upstairs, the basement bathroom no longer got regular use. I, for one, hated the subterranean room and refused to patronize it, ever — but, I checked in on it from time to time to make sure that it wasn’t getting *too* gross.
That’s how I noticed that the shower floor was starting to get dirty — even though no one was using it. I never caught it in the act of flooding, but I started to keep a closer eye on the bathroom — and I ordered Taylor to bring up the issue with our landlord again.
Alas, our landlord issued a rather frustrating deferral: basically, “We’ll deal with it when we deal with it, and don’t flood it in the meantime.” I was not pleased.
And thus, the basement situation was essentially in limbo. Until the mainline was replaced, no other fixes could happen: no new carpet, no black mold removal, no drywall repair, no shower replacement, etc. After all, another flood could instantly destroy all of that work.
Nevertheless, we were itching to get started. As it stood, the space fell barely usable. Sure, I had cleaned the carpet — but how “clean” can sewage carpet really get? [Note: We were advised by the plumber that it needed to be torn out as soon as possible — which, unfortunately, was not very soon.]
I didn’t like allowing the kids to even enter the basement — so the space was, for the moment, a little-used guest and/or craft room. [Note: I was transparent about the situation with our potential guests.]
Which brings us to the beginning of this month: January 2022. Against my better judgment, I decided to make a new duvet cover for Bo, rather than buying one. (Not the best use of my time, but it hearkened back to my crafty roots.) Since our sewing machine was [temporarily] in the basement bedroom, I had ample opportunity to check the bathroom during the several nights that I worked on the project.
One of those nights, I discovered something downright alarming. Though no one had recently used the bathroom for its erstwhile purpose, the toilet water was distinctly brown. Even worse — when I attempted to flush, it merely glugged piteously and refused to go down.
Hindsight suggests that I ought to have sounded the alarm with more urgency. Instead, I forgot all about the toilet in my excitement at finishing the duvet cover. (I rarely finish things anymore, so every completed project is a huge win for me.) Several days went by before I finally called Taylor’s attention to the escalating situation.
On a Tuesday night, I told him, “Hey, poop backed up into the basement toilet, and when I tried to flush it, it wouldn’t go down.”
Taylor shot me a suitably disturbed look. “What? That can’t happen.”
I shrugged. “I’m just telling you what I saw. Will you help me investigate?”
“No, like, poop can’t ‘back up’ into the toilet. There’s an airlock that prevents backflow.” <pause> “Unless the backflow overcame the airlock? But even then, I’m not sure how the mainline would flow into the toilet without flooding out of the shower first.”
I shrugged again. “Look — will you help me, or not?”
We trotted downstairs, and I was secretly pleased that Taylor’s typical nonchalance was totally absent. “Are you sure that your sister didn’t just use the bathroom last time she was here?” [Note: While I might hate subterranean bathrooms, my autistic sister loves them.]
In response, I flung open the shower door. “And she pooped all over the floor, too?”
Taylor paled at the sight of the sewage-covered shower floor — not an active flood, but undeniable evidence of a narrowly-averted disaster. Eventually, my husband sighed and said, “Look. Our landlord said that he doesn’t want to deal with this until the spring. I don’t think this is a great time of year for them financially.”
“Well, it’s gonna be a much worse time of year if they have to pay for an emergency plumber again! You need to tell him that this is happening.”
“Uh, the only reason we got away with getting a plumber last time was because you were dealing with his wife, and he was in the middle of an overseas flight. He’s still pretty annoyed that you called a plumber.”
I scoffed. “What was I supposed to do? Leave the clog?”
Taylor sighed again and answered, “Probably he just wanted me to snake the line again. You know, hundred dollar rental versus thousand dollar plumbing job.”
“Our basement was flooded! It was an emergency!”
“I’m not sure he sees it that way.”
“The snake would have messed up the Orangeburg even more!”
Taylor shrugged. “I’m just telling you the impression I got from his texts.”
I was flabbergasted — but I shouldn’t have been. As Taylor had told the plumber, things with our landlord are… complicated.
But that’s not quite accurate. In a way, the situation is really very simple: our landlord hasn’t raised the rent in a decade, so we have absolutely no leverage. Operating within that framework is where things get complicated — like, for instance, pleading for a new mainline that wouldn’t leave poop smeared across our shower floor.
Alas. “No leverage” doesn’t hold a candle to “costs thousands of dollars”. It seemed that a new mainline would take a miracle.
The sewer mainline was constantly on my mind for the next several days — even when I wasn’t at my house.
On Wednesday, the kids and I drove down to Colorado Springs for our weekly visit to my parents’ house. While there, I discussed the situation with my mom, who herself has managed rental properties for longer than I’ve been alive.
“Ugh,” she lamented. “I would have fixed that so fast if I were your landlady.”
“It’s a lot of money,” I pointed out.
“Not in the grand scheme of things! Did he even get additional quotes?”
“Uh, not yet.”
“Such a pilot,” she muttered.
“What?”
My mom laughed. “Well, this hardly fits your dad, but it seems to apply to your landlord [who flies for Delta]. There’s a stereotype that pilots are super stingy — you remember that joke about the pilot’s kid? He goes to a real person’s house, sees regular soap, and says, ‘Look Daddy — big soap!’?”
“Well, pilots are ‘real people’, too,” I pointed out. “But yeah… that does sound familiar.”
[Note: We stopped exclusively using hotel soap around the time that my dad graduated from law school and simultaneously realized that his sensitive skin didn’t like complimentary soap — which, admittedly, tends to be pretty caustic. I believe my lawyer-pilot father only uses Dr. Squatch these days.]
I sighed. “I guess… I don’t know, it’s just giving me so much anxiety. Like, I know that it’s going to flood any day now, and I wish that our landlord would just fix the problem before it comes to a head.”
“Can Taylor snake the drain preemptively?”
I grimaced at the thought. “I mean, maybe we’ll talk about it this weekend, but it’s so bad for the Orangeburg. And, I worry that if we keep doing these stopgap measures, then our landlord won’t have any incentive to actually fix the underlying problem. He’ll just assume that we can keep putting off the inevitable every few months until our mainline is quite literally just a subterranean poop river, and then it’ll be even harder to fix.”
My mother snorted. “Well, I hope he comes around.”
“Yeah,” I sighed. “Me too.”
On Thursday night, back in Golden, I had a similar conversation with my Life Group. I struggled to explain why, despite the urgency of the situation, we were essentially just sitting on our hands.
“Well, it’s complicated,” I said again. “Yes, it’s his duty as our landlord, but it feels like we can’t escalate the situation without risking this good thing we have going. Like, we don’t know where his head’s at. Maybe he’s just looking for a reason to kick us out, and if we send him a formal letter or something, then that’ll just be the final straw that he’s waiting for.” I paused, then conceded, “Or maybe it’s totally not like that at all! It’s just hard to know, especially since he and Taylor communicate, like, exclusively via text.”
The women to whom I vented eyed me inscrutably. Eventually, the hostess sighed. “Well, that is really hard, Holly.”
I groaned. “It’s just… making me so anxious. I just want this situation resolved.”
She nodded. “I certainly hope that it all works out, but based on what you’ve said, it’s difficult to envision how it will anytime soon!”
“Yeah. This whole thing is shaping up to be a blog post, which is why I’m concerned.”
The hostess laughed. “Well, I’m sure it’ll be hilarious, if you do end up writing it.” [Note: This feels very meta.] Glancing at the time, she concluded, “Well, we need to wrap up. Would you close us in prayer?”
I nodded. “For sure.”
I prayed over the issues presented by each of the women, asking that we would all be given the wisdom appropriate for our specific situations. And then, a bit sacrilegiously, I prayed, “And Lord, I ask that You would resolve this mainline situation for us, and that, as far as the east is from the west, so far would our new mainline separate our poop from us — that just as you have irrevocably removed our sins from us, so also would our sewer irrevocably remove our waste from us, never to defile our home again.” [Note: This was, of course, a rather flippant appropriation of Psalm 103:12.]
We all laughed — although, of course, my prayer was in earnest.
The next day was Friday, and it was Bo’s first time back to pre-K in nearly a month. (There was Christmas break, and then we got Covid, and then his teacher got Covid. Things are finally back to normal… for now.)
Midway through the morning, I had a phone call with an administrator at Bo’s potential kindergarten school. This administrator is the gateway into the Early Access program (which, I learned, actually has statewide criteria). Unfortunately, though, our call didn’t go super well.
For one, I literally had to *ask* for the administrator’s first name (since she had neglected to provide it to me, even over the course of several emails). For another, I learned that Early Access is super-duper exclusive — like, tests-at-the-97th-percentile-in-seven-categories sort of exclusive. I mean, Borealis reads at an early first grade level, but I’m fairly certain that he doesn’t, like, make friends at an early first grade level. (Poor kid. With engineer parents, he never had a chance.)
So, in short, this call was basically an opportunity for Ms. Administrator to subtly suggest that I needed to reevaluate Bo’s educational options for next year.
This conundrum loomed large in my mind, but with Aza tugging at my skirts, I couldn’t do much more than conduct a cursory assessment of alternative avenues. Eventually, I gave up trying to parse through the different options and asked my daughter if she wanted to go to Goodwill. She, of course, said yes. (A harder decision was which Goodwill to patronize. After much thought, she decided, “Not the Little Goodwill — the Big Goodwill.”)
Once there, I kept an eye on the worsening weather as Aza played with the toys. The morning had started off sunny, but by the time we checked out, huge flakes tumbled from the sky. At home, we barely had time for a quick snack and a trip to the potty, and then we left once more — this time, to retrieve my son.
Australis waited in our warm car while I shivered outside the preschool as the head teacher got Borealis ready. (It seemed that I wasn’t the only one struggling to get back into the swing of things.) It was obvious that I ought to have grabbed a heftier jacket. So dumb, I silently berated myself. But, at least we don’t have to leave our house for the rest of the day!
At home, the kids immediately settled back into their normal rapport — half peaceful, half wildly violent. They intermittently paused in their antics to observe, “Mommy, it’s snowing!”
Between starting washes and folding laundry, I engaged with their play, which ranged from book-reading to Lego-building to bird watching. With regard to the latter, I highlighted how the birds were *so* thankful for our bird feeders when the snow covers up their normal food, and how we ought to be *so* thankful for our wonderful house that keeps us warm when it’s very cold and snowy outside. This concept seemed to resonate with them — but it was kind of hard to tell, because Bo chose that moment to shove his sister, who immediately clawed his cheek in retribution. Thus, our gratitude lesson promptly transitioned into disciplinary action.
As the weather continued to worsen, I worried that the roads wouldn’t remain passable for our family friend Nova, who was set to come over around 3pm. I glanced at the clock. Well, the roads are alright now. Surely they won’t be much worse after only another hour?
Suddenly, Bo hopped off the couch and announced, “Mommy, I will need you to wipe me after I go poopie!”
I groaned as he sprinted to the bathroom. Approximately twenty seconds later came my summons: “Please come wipe me!”
I dutifully went to wipe my son’s bottom, and as I did, I was overcome with a terribly ominous feeling. I hustled him through flushing and washing his hands, then muttered, “Ok, go play with Aza. Mommy has to go check on something.”
I paused at the door to the basement. Maybe it’s not too late, I told myself. Maybe I’ll have caught it in time.
Alas. I had not.
I raced down the stairs, and my landing resounded with a deafening splash. I could have floated a small boat on that super-saturated carpet. Unfortunately, I would not be solving this problem on my own.
After wiping off my soiled feet, I jogged upstairs and called Taylor. No answer. I immediately hung up and called back. This time, to my relief, he answered after only a few rings. (A double phone call: the universal signal of distress.)
My voice broke as I tried to summarize the situation in a single accusation. “Remember how I said that you needed to tell our landlord that the mainline situation was getting worse? I really, really wish that you had.”
“Oh, no,” Taylor breathed. “Ok, I’ll go rent a snake and come right home. I’m sorry you have to deal with this.”
“I am, too,” I mewled — and with that, I began to cry. I knew this catastrophe could be fixed, but I also knew the work required to fix it. I racked my brain for a way to juggle the situation with both children awake — and, seemingly, my thoughts summoned said children. Both of them appeared around the corner and instantly misinterpreted the reason for my tears.
“I’m sorry, Mommy! I’m sorry, Mommy!” whimpered Aza as she hugged my legs. After a few seconds, her brother joined her with similar apologies.
Their innocent sincerity immediately buoyed my spirits. I laughed as I leaned down to hug them. “It’s ok, babies. It’s not your fault. Mommy’s not crying because of you — although your fighting does make me upset — but I’m crying because of something else, not because of you.”
Taylor snorted on the other line.
“They’re being really sweet!” I defended. “It’s good that they try to make me feel better when I cry.”
“It is very sweet,” Taylor agreed. “Ok, I have to grab my stuff, and then I’ll be on my way.”
I hung up and gave my kids another squeeze for good measure. “Let’s go back to the living room,” I suggested. “Mommy has to use her phone for a bit.”
I immediately pulled up Disney+ and threw on Doc McStuffins. (It almost counts as educational.)
“It’s a special occasion,” I explained to my delighted children. They didn’t argue that “crisis” was not necessarily the same as “special occasion”.
Having called Taylor already, the first person I needed to contact was our babysitter, Vienna. I sent her a text that essentially read, Hey, remember when you watched our kids when our basement was a poopy mess? Could you do that again, but like, right now?
I thought there was very little chance that it would work out. I couldn’t remember what time she got out of school, but I was fairly certain that track practice lasted past 2:30pm. Thus, I was surprised and relieved when she texted back that practice had been canceled due to the inclement weather, and she would actually be free to babysit.
When she asked what time we needed her help, I responded, Basically any time between now and bedtime, but 4-6:30pm is probably our most-needed window. But we’ll work with whatever you’re able to do! I’m really sorry… I hate asking so last-minute.
While I waited to hear back from her, I called my mom to update her on the situation.
“Hey, so… our basement flooded again.”
“Oh, no!” my mother gasped. “Can you get the mainline replaced right now? I can transfer the money to your account, and you can just work out the financial stuff with your landlord later.”
I fought back a giggle as I imagined trying to convince a plumber to trench out our mainline under the current circumstances: last-minute, snowy, and dark. No chance. “Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t work like that,” I sighed. “We’ll have to fix this clog tonight, and then hopefully our landlord will get the mainline replaced in the next couple weeks… especially since snaking the drain will put even more holes in the Orangeburg.”
“But you could just hire someone now to get it done as soon as possible — instead of having to wait on his timing! I already spoke to your father about it, and this is something that we’re totally ready to help you with financially.”
I smiled at her insistence. “Thank you, Mom. I really, really appreciate your generosity, and your willingness to help at a moment’s notice. If it comes down to it, we will definitely take you up on that offer.” I drew in a deep breath, then concluded. “But, I’m really hopeful that we won’t need to. I feel like this situation will finally be enough to force our landlord’s hand.”
“But what about tonight? You’ll just stay upstairs with the kids, right?”
I grimaced at the staggering amount of clean-up that lay ahead. “No, I can’t. Vienna’s gonna be here soon, and the best thing I can do is get the basement ready so that Taylor can start with the drain snake right away. The longer the flood sits, the more damage it does.”
My mother sighed heavily. “Ok — but I don’t like it.”
“I know. Me either.”
“Well, keep me updated, and let me know if you need me to read to the kids over FaceTime while you’re waiting for Vienna to get there.”
“Will do. Thank you again!”
I hung up and glanced at the screen. To my surprise, Vienna had texted — several minutes previously — that she’d ride down the hill with her mother, who was leaving for a work meeting in only fifteen minutes.
Thus, my harrowing afternoon was suddenly compounded by scheduling issues, too. In addition to my other responsibilities, I now had to cancel with Nova short-notice and quickly prepare the kids for Vienna’s imminent arrival — but first, I had to take care of a very inconvenient task: I really, really had to pee.
Normally, peeing is not a reason for such consternation — but normally, our bathroom is connected to a functioning sewer mainline. At this point, using the upstairs toilet felt like a slightly-less-efficient method of simply urinating on the basement carpet. In short: not ideal. Peeing in the bathtub would yield the same result. Furthermore, abiding by the maxim, “If it’s yellow, let it mellow!” is more palatable when we’re not expecting company in mere minutes — and ditto for relieving myself outside.
Finally, I settled for peeing into a dirty bowl — no need to soil a clean one! — then tossing the liquid outside. The rapidly-falling snow quickly covered my tracks. I stuck the bowl back into the dishwasher and hoped fervently that we’d have the ability to run it tonight. Then, I washed my hands with the thinnest stream of water, and turned around to see —
“I need go poopie!”
— Australis sprinting to the bathroom at top speed. I sighed heavily and trudged after her.
Not surprisingly, the bathroom is another realm in which my kids are total opposites. While Bo rarely sits for longer than fifteen seconds, Aza views her bathroom trips as more of an exciting social excursion — especially since she is *always* accompanied by either Taylor or me. (We learned the hard way that she will not yell for us to come wipe her.)
Thus, she passes the time by asking us to sing, or criticizing our facial expressions (“Don’t do that, Mommy!”), or even requesting a hand or foot massage. Most of all, though, she cannot be rushed. (“Still going poopie!”) Accordingly, I know to block off at least ten minutes when I’ve been summoned in this manner.
Accordingly, I decided to call Nova while I waited for Aza to finish her business — and/or for Vienna to arrive, whichever came first. I glanced at the clock and grimaced. When my friend picked up, I blurted, “Please tell me you haven’t left the house yet.”
“Uh, no, I haven’t,” Nova answered, clearly taken aback. “What’s going on?”
I briefly explained the situation, then waved away her immediate offers of help. “No, no, no — you’re leaving for Miami in the morning! You don’t need to be mucking up your travel plans with… literal muck.”
“But I can help watch the kids!”
“Nope, Vienna’s gonna be here any minute. It’s all good. But, I’m really sorry to cancel so last-minute! I wish we could have seen you before your big trip!”
“Thank you! I’ll let you know how it goes!”
And with that, I was back to watching Aza on the potty. I glanced once more at my phone and saw that our babysitter had given me a five-minute warning. At this point, there would certainly be poop in the bathroom when she arrived; I, however, wanted to be out of its general vicinity. (It’s hard to seem authoritative when you’re actively wiping a toddler butt.) So, I decided to try my luck.
“Aza, are you ready to be all done?”
“No! Still going poopie.”
“Don’t you want to be ready for Miss Vienna to come over?”
My daughter cocked her head. Initially icy toward the young babysitter, Aza has since warmed toward her — especially over the last couple months. After several seconds of contemplation, my daughter finally decided, “All done going poopie. Wipe me.”
And so, when Vienna arrived a couple minutes later, I was with both kids in the living room. Thankfully, I had had the chance to quickly explain to Bo that yes, Miss Vienna had indeed come over last night — but now she would be coming over to play with them *tonight*, too. How fun!
Since I figured that he’d be able to track with my reasoning, I hastily added, “The bathroom in the basement is broken. There is a pipe coming out of the potty that is supposed to carry away all the poop and pee that we flush down the toilet, but now the pipe isn’t working, and so the poop and pee got all over the floor, and Mommy has to help Daddy make it better. Daddy is going to be home soon to fix it, but I have to go clean up the mess right now. But, it’s very important that you and Aza stay upstairs with Miss Vienna, because it’s not a safe place for kids to be. Ok, baby?”
Bo’s brow furrowed in concentration. Finally, he concluded, “The potty broke, and now we can’t use it for ten or nine years.”
I snorted. “I sincerely hope that we’ll be able to use the potty again a lot sooner than that.”
Just then, Vienna arrived, so I left Borealis to individually ponder the fate of our basement bathroom. I greeted our babysitter with an ironic smile. “Hey, this feels familiar.”
My sarcasm was apparently lost on her. She merely smiled back and said, “Yeah, I’m glad it worked out!”
Borealis — who also misses my sarcasm with fair regularity — ran to give Vienna an affectionate embrace. She’s always been his favorite of our assortment of babysitters, and I think that preference might have something to do with her big teal eyes, long bronze hair, and pixie-ish physique. (At the very least, her appearance inspired one of the recommendations we make to boy parents: “Hire a hot babysitter. Then your son will love when you leave.”)
Bo immediately led his babysitter over to his “doctor’s kit” — a toy with which Vienna has firsthand experience. As I watched, she patiently endured his diagnosis of “a very high fever”, and his assessment that she needed “a lot of medicine”. (Thankfully, the kit comes only with a functionless plastic syringe, not an actual IV set-up. I doubt we would have any medicine left, if that were the case.)
I kissed Aza and ushered her over to the ongoing game. “Mommy has to go in the basement,” I reminded her. “But I love you, and I’ll see you soon.”
As I walked away, I called over my shoulder to Vienna. “Oh, and right now there’s an Aza poopie in the potty. I can’t flush it yet. So, just… be aware, I guess.”
And with that, it was back to the dungeon for me.
There’s a large part of me that wants to document this portion in grisly detail: the squelch of the carpet underfoot; the regret that, even with the foreknowledge of this impending flood, I had neglected to clear everything off the floor; the rush to move “unaffected items” to higher ground, lest they suddenly become “affected items”; the delight at stumbling upon a box I had labeled “Towels for donation to pet shelter”, which was full of trash-quality rags perfect for this situation; the dismay at finding so much standing water in the bathroom and shower pan; the disgust of vacuuming down not just liquid, but also floating brown particulates; the gratitude that, besides the particulates, most of the water was from our laundry — as evidenced by frothy detergent bubbles; the frustration of constantly trying to compensate for our shop vac’s missing wheel — a task which dramatically increased in difficulty when the base was full of water; the misery of pushing round after round of sewage through the storage room, through the garage, and out to the lower driveway; the amusement that, of all days for this catastrophe to occur, it happened on the one with such significant snowfall; the exhaustion from hauling stunningly heavy rugs, blankets, towels, etc. outside; the preemptive exhaustion from the knowledge that I’d have to deal with those soaked items in the coming days; the despair at wet-vacuuming carpets that seemed to have absorbed a limitless amount of sewage; and, finally, the overwhelming relief when, forty-five minutes later, Taylor finally arrived with a drain snake in tow.
But, there’s a larger part of me that wants to finish this post in a timely fashion, so we’ll just have to settle for that preceding list.
Upon seeing me, my husband’s brow furrowed in concern. “Hey babe. How’re you doing?”
“I feel like Jean Valjean,” I answered. “Except way less BA.”
His brow furrowed even further. “What?”
“Nevermind. Just that this is super gross. Did you get through to our landlord?”
Taylor nodded. “Yeah, it sounds like he realizes that he just has to bite the bullet and get the mainline replaced. I told him that I’d be taking care of tonight’s clog, but that this problem is coming to a head, fast.”
I mustered a relieved grin. “Well, that, at least, is good news. Have you been up to see the kids?”
“No. I just came in through the garage.”
“Ok. Leave your shoes at the base of the stairs, but go say hi to them. And please flush Aza’s poopie. It’s been there for like an hour.”
Taylor’s eyebrows shot up. “Flush it?”
I gestured to the almost-empty shower pan. Even as we looked on, the drain gurgled with the influx of more liquid. I figured Vienna might have washed her hands or something.
“Yeah. I made enough room for it, and it’s not alright to just leave poop in the toilet when we’ve got company.” <pause> “Or ever, really.”
Taylor: <grunts uncertainly>
I sighed. “Do you want to scoop it out and throw it in the trash instead?”
Taylor grimaced. “I’ll just flush it.”
He returned several minutes later to find me washing my hands.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“How do I get this carpet out?”
“Oh! Are we finally at that point?”
I surveyed the disgusting industrial carpet, much of which had already been permeated by sewage [at least] once before. “Yeah. We were already planning on replacing it, but now we’re definitely not going to save it. We’ll figure out the financial piece with our landlord later — I mean, at this point, I’m willing to purchase new carpet myself. But either way, *this* is not staying in my house.”
Taylor grimaced again. “Yeah… I think I agree. That yellow utility knife should work — and grab a mask while you’re up there. The carpet’s wet, which should trap most of the dust, but better to be cautious.”
I ran upstairs and poked my head into the living room. “How’s it going?”
Vienna laughed. “Pretty good, except I keep having ‘a very high fever’.”
Bo still puttered about the doctor’s kit, although a profusion of toys on the floor suggested that they’d also done more than just medical cosplay. Aza, in contrast, had been laying on Mache’s bed and now launched up to give me a hug. I held her back with a hand to her forehead — since that was the only part of me that I knew was clean.
“I’m sorry, baby,” I sympathized. “Mommy’s all dirty. You can’t give me a hug right now.”
Aza whimpered, but accepted the kiss I placed on her forehead. (Hopefully my lips were also clean.) I grabbed the utility knife and a mask, then jogged back downstairs.
How to describe removing those carpets? Hmm… It was kind of like finally telling someone off after years of silence. I had hated those carpets for so long that the conflict now felt personal; thus, it was incredibly gratifying to mete out justice upon the source of so much frustration. Unsurprisingly, though, the process wasn’t just a neat little victory for me: the carpet got its revenge as I hauled it outside.
First of all, it was heavy. Sure, I had done a cursory pass with our upright wet-vacuum, but my initial goal had only been to suck up the standing water; obviously, that goal changed before I succeeded in fully drying the carpet. I considered doing another few passes with the wet vac, but decided that this would be an instance of rapidly-diminishing returns. Instead, I’d just buckle down and muscle through the task, paring down the soaked carpet as needed.
Unfortunately, that “efficiency” led to another issue: the sewage-getting-on-my-clothes issue. Thus far, I had been able to mostly — but not entirely — avoid contact with the insidious liquid; however, carpet removal ended that streak. (Ew, poor word choice.)
For one, I couldn’t get the proper leverage for cutting the carpet without kneeling in the muck; for another, I wasn’t strong enough to carry the resultant, incredibly cumbersome rolls without letting them bounce off my knees/hips/chest/etc. Taylor was able to help me with the first carpet segment — the largest one — but then he was back to work on unclogging the drain. He had his disgusting task, and I had mine.
I wouldn’t be removing all the carpet that night, for two main reasons: 1) there was still a ton of stuff on the dry portion of the carpet: bed, table, sewing machine, etc., and 2) there was still a time element to my task — namely, our babysitter. (We could deal with the dry stuff later, for a lot less money.)
About halfway through this process, I realized that I hadn’t given Vienna dinner instructions. After another thorough hand-washing, I kicked off my shoes and trudged back upstairs. I set a pot of water on the range and got out a box of Annie’s Shells & White Cheddar. “Vienna, can you make this mac ’n’ cheese for them?”
“Sure!” she called from the living room.
“Great, thanks!” I yelled, then scuttled back to the basement before the kids could accost me in my current disgusting state.
As I returned to the task at hand, I had a sudden realization. I waited for a pause in Taylor’s work, then shouted, “Hey — I think this was the answer to my prayer from last night.”
“Yeah — I actually had that thought earlier,” Taylor bellowed back.
I laughed as I struggled against a particularly tough carpet fiber. “It feels awfully coincidental, otherwise.” <pause> “I guess this really was the only way to get our landlord to spring for a new mainline.”
“Apparently so.” And with that, the deafening roar of the drain snake resumed.
All told, I removed less than half of the total carpet that night. I stopped at the edge of the bed in the big bedroom, and didn’t even venture into the small bedroom — a room to which, technically, we have no rights.
About the latter, I asked Taylor, “What should I do here?”
From his place by the toilet, he turned around and used the back of his wrist to wipe his sweaty brow — or, at least, I hoped it was sweat. “I think just leave it,” he answered. “I’ll ask if we can box up all the stuff, but until then, we can’t really do much more than just leave on the fan.”
I gave the small room a cursory inspection. Thankfully, most of the items along the affected wall were already elevated on rickety metal shelves — and, in fact, “rickety metal shelves” seemed to be the theme throughout the room. What used to be an overnight crash pad for our landlord and/or his wife had slowly just become a densely-packed storage room for their [long-expired] basic necessities.
In short, the room wasn’t different from the rest of our house in character — just in ownership. I wanted that room densely-packed with *my* belongings — but, Taylor was right; for the moment, I could do nothing about that desire.
I hauled the last carpet-and-underpad bundle outside and was mildly annoyed to see that my earlier loads had already frozen. This was hardly ideal weather for carpet drying (i.e. weight reduction), but there was basically nothing I could do about it now. I put the problem out of my mind and returned upstairs in relatively good spirits.
The kids were occupied, so I washed my hands thoroughly and crept to the bathroom. A few minutes later, I had taken a very quick shower, gotten dressed, and tossed my soiled clothing in the washer. (I refrained from starting a wash until I had Taylor’s go-ahead — that, and his own set of contaminated clothes.)
Thus prepared, I ventured into the living room and was immediately greeted by an aggressive Aza hug. I knelt down so she could squirm into my lap.
“You took a shower!” she observed, stroking my wet hair.
“I did,” I confirmed. “Mommy was really gross. I needed to use soap to get clean.”
Bo finally abandoned his play and came over to greet me. “You were getting disgusting in the basement because the bathroom is broken, and so now you had to get clean.”
I blinked in surprise. “Uh… that’s an accurate, if tactless, thing to say, Boby.”
My son leaned in for a hug in a way that suggested a complete obliviousness to the true nature of his newest nickname — a portmanteau of “Bo” and “baby”. (I’m trying to make his nicknames less diminutive, but old habits die hard. At least this one is slightly less obvious than its predecessor, which was just explicitly “Bo Baby”.)
I peered over his head to Vienna, who looked exhausted from her time with the kids… or maybe from the thought of so much sewage loose in our basement. I imagined that she, too, would desire a shower — but probably at her own house.
On that note, I asked, “Is your mom home yet?”
She checked her phone. “Uh, she just texted that her business meeting is over, but she’s gonna stop for groceries now.”
I glanced outside at the dark, snowy roads. It seemed much later than only 5:30pm. She’s tougher than I am, I thought.
Unfortunately, that toughness put me in an awkward situation. I considered saying, Better hope she shops quick, because you probably won’t like walking home! But, that seemed like a really fast and unnecessary way to lose a loyal (and reasonably-priced!) babysitter.
So, instead, I conceded, “Ok, then we can take you home. Can you help me get the kids in their jackets? I’ll go start the car.”
A few minutes later, we were bundling the kids into my still-thawing Explorer. Aza, of course, had refused to put on her boots, so I carried her directly to her seat. Bo, in contrast, was fully decked out in jacket, boots, gloves, and hat, which subtly conveyed a total lack of confidence in my driving abilities. Unfortunately, I tended to agree with him.
Once my Arctic expeditionary made it into his carseat, we embarked upon the terrifying half-mile excursion to Vienna’s house. The snow was deepening by the moment, but thankfully, we arrived at our destination after only a handful of harrowing drifts. I pulled up to her sidewalk, which was remarkably clear of snow.
“Thank you again, Vienna,” I said sincerely. “You really did us a solid tonight. Oh, wait — let me pay you now, before I forget.”
The kids chattered in the backseat as I quickly Zelled our payment — more than the normal rate, because she really had done us a solid.
“Got it!” Vienna confirmed. “And no worries. I’m glad that I was able to help!”
With that, she opened the door and stepped out onto the sidewalk — which was, in reality, a small river of slush. Poor Vienna shrieked in surprise, and I apologized profusely. I felt so stupid for mistaking the band of grey for anything other than slush, but at least her house was only steps away.
After executing a seven-point turn, I artlessly sledded our car back down the hill and into our driveway. Once inside, I immediately shuttled the kids through their nighttime routine. Taylor appeared long enough to bestow no-contact bedtime kisses before leaving for Home Depot. I, for one, could barely believe that we were still within the four-hour rental window — or even in the same day. Needless to say, my bedtime verve was pretty lacking.
After the kids were tucked in for the night, I shuffled to the dining room table to wait for Taylor’s return. I spent a few minutes responding to texts, then got out my laptop and started on this story — because, as I had previously noted, this situation was kind of the quintessential blog post.
Better get writing — time’s a-wasting!
And, with regard to our sewer mainline… time’s still a-wasting.
I’ll spare you the details — the protracted texts between Taylor and our landlord, culminating in a plan to garner three quotes; the first plumber, who got to our house but refused to park and come inside because there was “too much snow”; his replacement, who scoped the mainline and identified three separate tree-root-induced cave-ins; the next plumber, who marveled at the dilapidated state of our sewer, then stuck around to tell us about his dog, the “world’s largest Cane Corso” (a claim disproved by a cursory Google search); and the final plumber, who swore up and down that he had scheduled this appointment with Taylor (he hadn’t), then eschewed scoping the pipe in favor of just asking me the length of Orangeberg (which I knew) and its starting and ending points (which I didn’t know).
After all that, we received… one quote. (Not surprisingly, it was from the first plumber’s replacement — you know, the one who actually came inside.) And so, here we are, two weeks later, and barely closer to having our mainline replaced.
To put it mildly: the delay is infuriating. I’m back to running downstairs every few hours to ensure my basement hasn’t flooded again. (Admittedly, though, clean-up would certainly be easier this time around.) When I started writing this post, I sincerely thought it’d have a lovely wrap-up: something like, “And now, after all this struggle, we can finally use the garbage disposal again.” I mean, I guess that doesn’t really count as “lovely” — but at the very least, I want something… conclusive.
Obviously, I don’t have anything like that with regard to the sewer mainline. Instead, how’s this: In conclusion, the next time I’m losing sleep over a household utility… I’m gonna accept my parents’ money without a second thought.
[Author’s Note: For the record, the sewer was finally replaced in late February — by the one plumber who actually got us a quote. (It turns out that the other two sent their quotes to our landlord only, and disregarded Taylor’s request to be copied on the emails.)
So, you know, now I can finally use our garbage disposal again.]