l i s a l a p e e r y . c o m

The Sympathetic Flood of 2005

I watched CNN for 34 days straight because I could not turn away from the hurricane coverage and the political rumble. Trying to write, doing my thing, responding to Anderson Cooper in print, but this is the middle of the story.

One sunny day in September I was feeling pretty good after 8 hours of helping people and running queries. I stopped off at my standard Mexican joint for a pick-up dinner and, I'm embarrassed to say, a packet of red Kool-Aid. The elevators were jammed up, so I carried my work tote, purse, burrito-on-a-plate, and mail up 12 flights of stairs. Once everything was in it's rightful place, I went to jump into the shower.

6:30 pm There I was in the tub fiddling with the faucets and after a minute or so it hit me. The water was out. A quick call to maintenance and I learned that some pipe burst somewhere and the water was shut off to repair it. Should be back on by 7pm. No Kool-Aid. I ran out to the store and got some bottled water and salad fixings. I settled in to watch tv and eat.

7:45pm I checked faucet in the kitchen, still no water.  I poured bottled water into the coffee maker for tea and wrote.

9:15pm I was writing, surfing and watching CNN. By this time Rita had hit and there was a story about dehydrating cows in Texas and Mississippi that sent me over the edge.Thank goodness the phone rang.

While talking, I started my evening routine. Holding the phone to my ear, I got up from my chair and walked across the room, with only votive candles lighting the way to the powder room. Left, right, trip, giggle, talk, slosh, glosh... what? Wet! Water! "Arrrrghhhh! ARRRRGGHHHH!"

Water is everywhere that I can see, which isn't far. Can't go turning on the the lights when you're standing in water. I turned on the bathroom light finally and shrieked, "DAMN!." The kind of exhalation you don't even think about, it just comes out. I saw the tub was totally (obviously) overflowing. "Yeah, right!" my phone friend scoffed. He's only known me since April and still hasn't figured out what it's like to be me. He asked if I had renter's insurance, and suddenly had to go. I called my neighbor Raj. He's always getting into similar situations, and even if he couldn't help out he could help me laugh. But he didn't answer the phone. I called my dad, with the same result. "Every man in my life!" I mutter, and look around at the lake in my foyer.

I cope by calling. I call everyone I know until someone listens. It's better than lighting up, anyway. I finally called my girl MaryJo and told her to come over for a footsoak in my hallway.

"Oh no Lisala." MaryJo is used to these things, being my friend of six years. The truth was, we could have had a little wading-pool-mini-spa that night. "What happened?"

She knew what was up before I told her the whole thing. I was standing in my hallway leading from the front door to the bedroom entryway, between the restroom and the closets. I was standing ankle deep in water. The hem of my pants was soaked. Every which way I turned led to more water. I went back to the living room where it was dry and on tv the streets were soaked, from Hurricane Rita.  MJ suggested this was a sympathetic flooding, and I should turn off the tv. I put down newspapers to soak up water. I wrang out washcloths into my actual footspa. I remember trying to kneel without getting my knees wet. "Oh no, MJ, I hope the woman downstairs isn't effected by this," and as I spoke the words I heard KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. Loud. It sounded like the way the federal drug enforcement agents knock on druggies' doors in the movies.

As MJ told me "there's no need to worry" about the woman downstairs, the man at my door told me she called after-hours maintenance about water leaking through the ceiling. "You got a dry-vac?" I asked. Then I had to explain the tub overflowed, but I left out that it had been overflowing for probably an hour if not more. "Uh, you got this all right?" he looked at me like I had fallen out of the sky. I looked at all the newspaper I'd thrown down on the floor that he couldn't see, and he walked away. No dry-vac, I guessed.

 MJ let me freak out for an hour longer as I threw towels on the floor and wrang them out. After telling me to get out all the clothes and old blankets, and wished me good luck. It was time for bed. Right around the time I started feeling anxious and completely foolish, the phone rang. The universe cares about me.

My guardian angel actually promised to bring his dry-vac over and help out. We talked as I walked on towels and yes, clothes, blankets, sheets and pillow cases to soak up water. But a funny thing happened. When one area would start to feel dry, another area would be soaked. Once I dry out the wet area, the dry part is soaked. I was just pushing water around and getting the least amount up. I gave up around 2 am and went to bed.

I crossed the floor to set the alarm and felt something cold. Not cold, wet. "Mary, Margaret and Clementine get out of here!" I interrupted Nate to yell. There was a large wet circle in the middle of the living room. No trace of where it came from, just a circle. I bet apartments up and down my hall all had a mysterious wet spot on their floors somewhere. I didn't realize till much later the water outside my door in the hallway was ankle deep as well.

5:15pm the next day By now, I had wrung out 15 gallons of water with my hands. My finger jewels were gleaming. After I sprayed the carpet numerous times with "Shout," my angel arrived and we got up another 10 gallons with the vac, and it still wasn't dry. I hit it all weekend with the fan, and by Sunday night it was dry and smelled fresh and looked brand new.

I later found out that's exactly how they clean carpets: they drench them with hot water and a detergent solution, let it soak for a few hours, and dry vac it up. My little mishap actually helped out. At least my landlord will be impressed with how clean the bedroom is once I move.

They say every cloud has a silver lining, but this cloud had two. I had to drag everything in my bedroom to the living room and kitchen, which forced me to throw out a lot of crap. I have a lot more space now. I plan on purchasing one of those machines and cleaning the rest now.

The bonus? My landlord never found out.