Flash Flood

Have you ever lived without running water for 48 hours?

I don’t suggest it.

As a poor college student, it would be safe to say that I am blessed to have an incredible living situation. The location is perfect (only a few streets down from the back gates of LMU), the home is gorgeous (large, spacious, with 5 bedrooms), and above all else, the company is great (awesome neighbors and fun roommates).

But there is something I wish I would have been warned about before I moved into my dream home at the ripe ol’ age of twenty-one.

Living in a beautiful home, means taking care of a beautiful home.

And trust me. I learn something new about house care everyday.

….“What the heck is happening!”

This was Jesse Chin, my twenty-year-old roommates’ first reaction when he came home from a calm and relaxing spring break in Palm Springs, to find our newly remodeled kitchen covered in an inch thick of sewage water.

“I was frantic” he said. “I immediately turned off the main water source and started sopping up the mess with every spare towel I could find.”

While Jesse and the rest of my roommates and I were on vacation, a wade pool had begun to formulate in the kitchen, dining and living room of our home. Water poured like a mini Niagara Falls from every orifice of the kitchen, cascading from underneath the cabinets and bursting out of pipes.

It was not the first flood our Regis Way home’s kitchen had seen, but it was certainly the worst. In order to cut costs and save money, the owners of the house used cheap plumbing and unqualified workers to do the kitchen remodel.

House Care Lesson Number One:

Don’t take shortcuts.

After calling an emergency plumber, it was determined that a pipe may be clogged, but even after turning the water back on the source of the leak could not be found. So, the plumber told Jesse to keep the main water line on, explaining that it was probably a freak accident or the clog had passed, and ensured him that everything would be fine.

House Care Lesson Number Two:

Don’t listen to plumbers your cheap landlord sent over.

“So, I went upstairs” Jesse said, “and then I came back down twenty minutes later to find the kitchen covered in water once again! It was a nightmare.”

As a result of the floods, the blonde hardwood floors have become warped, and a few appliances have been ruined, but the worst problem of all is that the second flood occurred around 6pm, and no plumber would come out to help fix our home. Even worse, the next day was Easter, and no service would be done on those days either. By late Monday, when someone could finally come to fix the plumbing, there hadn’t been any running water in our home for 72 hours, which is against California state law.

House Care Lesson Number….

No at this point. We were just unlucky.

I never realized how much I depended on running water until I realized I could not take a shower, go to the bathroom, brush my teeth, wash my face, or drink tap water in my own home. These are modern conveniences that I take for granted daily.

Something else I under appreciate? My car. Which wouldn’t start that same Monday morning, and caused me to be late to class that I had a test in.

By Tuesday, we finally had a plumber to our home that discovered a clog in a pipe. He was at our home for a total of 30 minutes. It was considered an easy fix. Go figure. I also had AAA come out to my house and fix my car. All it needed was a new battery. Easy fix.

Go figure.

I guess my point in sharing all of this is that sometimes it takes a few minor tragedies for us to see how easily we take day-to-day things for granted. And a lot of times in life bad things happen at once. As the saying goes, “when it rains, it pours.”

I just hope next time it ‘pours’ it’s not in my kitchen.

-Courtney M. Myers