Fire and Attitudes

Mikaela and I are lucky we have good noses. We were packing to head down to the shore for two days, a gift from my mother. This is our only family vacation for the year. I smell something burning. Something plastic, the bad scent of an electrical burn. I tell Michael. A few minutes later Mikaela tells me that something smells wrong. All packing stops. Michael heads down to the basement and Mikaela and I sniff around upstairs. In a 200 year old house it could be coming from anywhere. I imagine smoldering wiring in between the walls. Michael couldn’t find the problem and the smell was getting worse. I think we should call the fire department and Michael heads back down the basement where he finally finds the problem: melting wires inside the hot water heater. What causes a hot water heater to suddenly have a melt down? Michael turns off the circuit breaker and we begin to air out the house and eventually start packing again. We are so lucky this happened before we left. I imagine coming back from our mini vacation to find a smoldering ash pile.

We do eventually leave, many hours later than planned. I ask Michael countless times, Are you sure the circuit breaker is off? Driving down to the shore I keep thinking about fire and attitudes. M had a fire in her house, also caused by a faulty hot water heater. It was a traumatic fire. Everything in the laundry room and hallway burned and the thick smoke from the melted fiberglass washtub covered everything else in the house with a layer of plastic soot that could not be removed. It looked like someone poured black strap molasses over the whole house.The clean up took months but no one was hurt. For years afterwards (still to this day) M broke up her life into before the fire, and after the fire and would still make comments about inane things like gravy spoons- I lost that in the fire. Every holiday there were reminders of things lost. About the same time J also had a fire. We had plans to spend the day at Longwood Gardens. When I called her house to confirm the time she said she had lost her address book and was glad I had called so she could get my number. We spent a nice day at Longwood and it wasn’t until the end of the day, while relaying a story about something else, that she mentioned the fire that had destroyed her entire house less than two weeks before. Two people with very different outlooks.

At times my imagination can be the enemy. Mine is vivid and well used. I can imagine all sorts of catastrophes with lightening speed. It runs in the family. B can imagine impending storms ruining plans weeks before a weather report is available. There could be a cold front moving in… Lately, my imagination has needed to be tamed. Without warning I can suddenly travel down a path that sees continued health crises, financial doom, travel nightmares trying to bring my daughter home from Ethiopia and now fires that ignite without warning.

It is all a matter of attitude and outlook. The glass full or empty. We were lucky we were home when the melting started. We had a wonderful two days away, even though half of the time the weather was uncooperative. I love the beach. Nigel loved exploring the sand and the water. We ran into fellow OCers on the boardwalk and got to hang out together. We are so very lucky.

Now that we are home, the adventure continues. Michael is upstairs taking a very cold shower. I am sure he will be quite awake by the time he comes down. I put a pot of water on the stove for doing dishes. It feels a bit like Little House on the Prairie. A great history opportunity for Mikaela and me. Maybe we will turn out the lights too.