Patrick Butler: Another Look

I don't believe in Murphy's Law unless, of course, whatever happens concerns me. Then I'm not so sure. Take last month. The float valve in the toilet tank wouldn't shut off and needed replacing.

"Why aren't you fixing the leak?" Janet asked after three weeks of wasting water. "The bill is going to be sky high."

Because I don't have five free hours to fix it," I said.

"It takes five hours?" she said.

"Trust me," I said. "Five hours minimum."

So when the water bill came I finally heaved myself out of Janet's recliner and went for a float valve. I read the boxes carefully at the store.

"EZ to install in 15 minutes," one said. The subtext meaning, "Even morons can do this."

I winced. Too ashamed to put it back, I bought the little box of pain. I knew what was coming and it wouldn't be pretty. At home, I sighed and went to disconnect the hose and drain the tank.

"Lock and load," I said with resolve, walking into the valley of the shadow.

Everybody knows, it seems, the home-plumber's adage "Righty-tighty, lefty-loosey" when it comes to unloosening something. But lying on my side, jammed into a space between the wall and sink cabinet at a weird angle, I couldn't see where "right" was. Twisting the wrong way, I cracked the permanent plastic connector on the hose beyond repair. Water spurted gently on my face.

"Let the games begin," I grunted like a Greco-Roman wrestler going for the gold at Beijing.

Twisting the wall shut-off valve, it refused to budge, rusted to its final resting place. WD-40 was useless and I knew if I put a wrench to it, I'd probably break it off and torrents of pressurized water would flood the house.

Not to worry. I went outside and shut off the main water line. But now there was no water in the entire house until the hose was fixed. People would be coming home soon and wanting water. It was July. They'd want showers. I would be the scourge of the household if I couldn't remedy the situation. The clock was running.

This is why I refuse to fix things. Better to let it lie than awaken the dragon.

I jumped in the car, driving seven miles to the hardware store. Carefully buying a flex hose with both proper ends, I raced back. Jamming myself back between said sink and wall, I realized with horror that embedded in the hose was a metal protrusion I hadn't seen.

It wouldn't fit. I couldn't alter it. I was crushed. Just then Janet walked in.

"Hey, you're fixing the leak," she said. "Great. Um, is that why there's no water in the kitchen, laundry room or the other bathroom?

"Something like that," I mumbled, my head face down in my arm. "This may take awhile."

"I'm making dinner for the kids soon. Is something wrong?"

"No, no," I quickly said. "This just takes time, y'know. Nothing to see here."

"You were kidding about five hours, right?" she asked dubiously.

"Of course," I said. "Ha, ha. I'm almost done."

Leaping back into the car, I zoomed to the hardware store. There were boxes of connectors similar to the wrong one I'd bought but none of what I needed. Glancing at my watch, it had been two hours.

"Only three more to go," I thought, taking a deep breath. "I can do this."

Racing to another store, I found boxes of the wrong connectors. On my knees, I frantically searched the back of the cavernous rack, tossing hoses right and left. Finally I found a single correct connector in a box.

"Eureka," I shouted. A salesperson magically appeared in a cloud of smoke and said, "Can I help you?

Returning to the waterless house, morose family members stood by, with arms folded.

"So, is this like, going to be fixed today?" one said as I rushed by. I nervously attached the hose. It fit.

"Thank you, God," I said loudly.

I installed the float valve in 15 minutes, just like it said on the box. Total time of repair, 195 minutes, a gallon of gas and emotional wear-and-tear.

"If I hadn't cracked that little-bitty plastic connector," I thought, "none of this would have happened. It would have been so easy."

Janet walked in again.

"This is so like relationship with God," I said, indicating the flex hose. "It's really not that hard if you know what you're doing, but we get our hands on things and trouble comes."

"How so?" she asked.

I took another look at the connection I'd broken through misperception and plowing ahead, thinking "righty-tighty" was all the information I needed. Suddenly it all seemed so obvious.

"OK, how about knowing 'where right is' may be skewed from your perspective, depending on what angle you're looking at it from," I said. "Approach God presumptuously and something simple gets complicated beyond belief, consuming emotional peace and precious time."

"That's great, honey," she said. "Now how about hooking up the home-theater sound system we got for Christmas?"

Patrick Butler
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