Kitchen towel

Abby came into the kitchen last night at about 9:45 to tell me there was water on the bathroom floor. This comment was made at the end of a very long couple days. The yard sale had been a success - by that I mean the kids each made some money, I do not mean that I would do that amount of work for that amount of money again - my amazing and wonderful friend Sandi had helped me all weekend (we had such a great time visiting and letting our kids play together.) The heat, lovely as it is, had zapped our strength. I had had no time to do anything inside but make bigger piles since Wednesday and it looked like a tornado had swept through the house. Church last night was great, but draining personally as I spoke in our Shepherding group and had several significant conversations and prayer times.

By 9:00 last night I was 110% wiped out and My Farmer was still at the farm. I was dog tired. The kids needed food and bed, and the house was HOT. I was dragging around like a slug and trying to steam some veggies to nourish my weary body. Every action was an effort and all I wanted to do was drop into bed.

Such was the state of things when Abby informed me there was water on the floor in the bathroom. I wearily grabbed a kitchen towel and said, "Here's a towel sweetie for you to go wipe it up." Something in my worn out brain clicked into gear when she looked at that miniscule towel and said, "But Mommy, that won't stop it." Her word choice caught my attention. Why would a small puddle of water need to be "stopped?" I surprised myself by moving quickly just as Titus yelled, "Mom, it's flooding in the bathroom under the sink."

AHHHHHHH - I raced around the corner to the bathroom and there was HOT water spraying violently out from under the sink in every direction. It was already flowing out into the hall. I momentarily panicked. "How in the world do I stop this and what is going to happen to our entire house if I don't figure out how to stop this geyser?!!!" Jesus alone is responsible for me keeping my head at this point - for I had no internal gumption left.

I sprinted downstairs to our basement - where the hot water heater resides - shouting as I went, "Josiah. Towels. In the bathroom. FAST!" By God's amazing grace and the diligent help of Miss Marie, every towel in the house was clean and folded on the table at the bottom of the basement stairs. (This is because I had washed them all but not folded in weeks and Miss Marie had folded them all and left them ready for me to carry upstairs to their various homes.) I grabbed one stack and threw it up the stairs for Josiah.

As I rounded the corner for the hot water heater I saw a rain cloud pouring water on the office floor - soaking Abby's desk and spattering my scrapbooking supplies. "Ahhh, my pictures!!!" That concern was rapidly overcome by the second raincloud I observed beginning to spurt in the general direction of the computer. "Oh no, this could get really bad, the computer backup hasn't been working in the last couple weeks." Pushing the computer out of the way of the spurts, and throwing towels over the electronic set-up on the desk, I remembered the hot water heater. Precious seconds had been lost with my concern over the stuff that was getting rained on, and the rain was still gathering strength upstairs.

"Dear Jesus please help me," I prayed as I gave one last burst of speed through the laundry room, between the freezer and cabinet, to the dark corner with the water heaters. Locating the knobs - "Thank you Lord that Jeff has had me help with a few plumbing projects along the way" - I turned them both and heard the glorious, relieving sound of the spray in the bathroom subsiding. "Is it stopped?" I hollered upstairs. To which my amazingly competent, mature, growing-up-so-quickly son Josiah replied, "Yeah."

Oh, deep exhale. Check the computer table - still dripping. Try to mop up the drips and realize it would be more productive to get back upstairs and clean up the puddles that are still dripping through the floor to the basement. Josiah and I use every towel to mop up the very hot water that is contained better than I imagined possible. Back downstairs to check the computer - no more drips, WHEW! It's still coming down under the first raincloud however. Back upstairs to get everything out from under the sink and mop up that pond. Downstairs - no more rain. Hallelujah.

Kids in bed. Hot water off. Burst pipe discovered. Bathroom clean. My Farmer home. Using my steam cleaner to extract water from the carpet in the basement. . . I'm tired. Oh so very tired. One foot in front of the other. Not much talking. Words take too much effort. Veggies are done (Thank God I noticed the pans as I ran through the kitchen at one point and turned the burners off. Otherwise they would have been charred veggies and ruined pans.) I can feel the health enter my body as the first green bean goes down. Oh, how I needed food two hours earlier - better late than never.

As I collapsed into bed at 11:30, blissfully aware that it was Sunday in the morning and I could sleep to my heart's content, I chuckled to myself that I had handed Abby a kitchen towel to clean up that spouting demon. It was woefully inadequate. I wonder how many other areas of life I'm trying to stop a geyser with a kitchen towel? Hmmm.