#Water

Water. We don’t realize how important water is until we don’t have it. We didn’t have water for three days. You see, we live outside the city and we have a well. Saturday afternoon we suddenly didn’t get water when we turned on the taps. When I checked out the pressure tank it was empty. The pump that is down the well didn’t pump anymore. I drove to the hardware store and purchased a control box, because ours looked fried. I paid 90 Bucks with tax and I was happy to get it. It was the last one. They told me once it is installed there is no returning it.

I installed it, turned on the breaker and the switch...surprise! No water. That’s when I realized the pump was gone...kaput. I tested it with an ohm meter and confirmed it. So I called a company that installs Well pumps and was told nobody can come until Monday. I said okay. We were lucky to have a few gallon jugs filled with water for emergencies. The water to flush the toilet I got from our ditch outside. Amazing how much water one flush takes. Nearly 3 gallons. My back is still aching from carrying all those pails of water from the ditch into the house. But at least we did have a source to get water from. Even though it was a bit yellow and had bits of grass floating in it. It is still the water left over from the snow. I pity the people who have no water at all. Now I understand the plight of the native people living up north with no water. I also feel sympathy with the people in Winnipeg who still have frozen water pipes. And the people who run the City in their incredible wisdom(?) won’t allow homeowners to hire private contractors to thaw the pipes. And the city workers are taking their sweet old time to get the job done. Typical government employee mentality!

This morning a couple of guys showed up at our place. When they tried to pull the pump out of the well casing, they discovered the fitting that diverts the water into the house was of a different size than their removal tool and the connection that takes the tool to pull it up was cross-threaded. So they left to get a tool made. They didn’t return until around 3 pm. By this time I was frantic and anxious, wondering if we’d have to spend another night and morning without water. They managed to pull the old pump out and then they installed a new pump with new pipe attached to it. We had water by 5 o’clock. Then we let the water run into the yard until it was running clean before we filled the pipes in the house. Finally water again. Life is back to normal. All we still need is a new pressure tank because the old one is also damaged. The diaphragm is leaking air. We’ll get is replaced tomorrow.

The only negative thing is the big check I had to write. This will make a big dent in our bank account. We could have gone on a little holiday with that money. Now we still have to pay for the new pressure tank. Sometimes the universe is downright mean. But we have water and that is most important.