One evening a week ago, I flipped on the light to go upstairs to our bedroom and nothing happened. I looked all the way to the top of the steps and saw that the bulb in the ceiling light was burned out. I knew from past experience with this fixture that it’s a two-person job replacing the bulb since someone needs to hold the ladder steady to prevent it from toppling off the landing with the other person on it. Shit.
I mentioned the situation to Husband when he got home that night. Then I mentioned it again the next night and then again one of the following mornings thinking that maybe the darkness was preventing movement. Since daylight savings has effectively removed all semblance of daytime, my window of opportunity was shrinking. I lucked out Saturday morning around nine o’clock when Husband said he was ready. I jumped up to get the ladder, at which point Husband announced he’d hold the ladder steady for me but he wasn’t climbing it.
This seemed an ironic choice since I’m the one who broke my arm in March walking across a level floor, but the game was on so I went to get my climbing shoes. Up on the ladder, I was unable to screw the bulb in so Husband had to climb up after all. He called down the bad news. The socket was cracked in half and wouldn’t accept the bulb. The fixture had to be replaced.
Everyone has watched Extreme Makeover so you’ll hear me when I say any show starring us would be called Extremely Not Doing it Ourselves. I’ve covered the home renovation and repair terrain before in entries here and here so I won’t belabor the domestic stress that ensues. To avoid that, we always hire Dominic, a talented handyman/contractor from the Dominican Republic whose name is hard to pronounce so it’s just Dominic. I said to Husband that we needed to call him right away.
HUSBAND: What’s the hurry?
OSV: Well, there’s no hurry for you. You go to bed at 10:00 and I’m still up so all the lights are on downstairs. But by the time I’m ready to go up it’s pitch dark.
HUSBAND: Meaning?
OSV: Meaning I have to feel my way up a dark staircase late at night.
HUSBAND: Can’t you use a flashlight?
OSV: Who am I, Tom Sawyer? We live in a cave? We’re in a two-story house. It needs to be lit.
Husband looked at me like this was way more than he bargained for. I looked back at him like excuse me for being so high maintenance as to expect electricity. We stood there staring each other down until one of us went and called Dominic.
Dominic has had much silent amusement at my expense, but he is always too polite to laugh out loud. A while back, I asked him to come replace the broken smoke detector in the kitchen and he suggested moving it to a different wall. He said he was surprised it never went off being directly across from the stove and toaster oven. I said he could go ahead and move it, but it’s never been a problem.
The fact is, it went off incessantly for eighteen years, especially when the kids toasted consecutive waffles, which was always. If you ask my children, they will tell you their main memory of me is jumping up and down underneath the smoke detector flailing a dishtowel back and forth until the stupid thing shut up. You can advise them to cherish that memory because it could be worse. At least I wasn’t wearing a miner’s helmet going up the stairs.
Daughter’s Featured Fotos are Just the Way It Looks
tourists
the major food groups
natural energy
bubble wrap skirt/tights in the city, part 4