Living without Water

Every trades person I have in my house looks at the prior trades person's work and bashes it. If my regular plumber is unavailable, I go with another one. "What shoddy work!" I hear. Same with every electrician, carpenter, etc. Last weekend I had problems with my well, I heard these exact words from an excavator "whoever constructed this well, did a shitty job." From that sentence on, this is what I hear "blah $ blah $ blah $ blah." As usual, my Type A response is "How much?"

The year 2016, a year I previously labeled The Year that Sucked, our well went dry for about six weeks. This was an awful end to a truly awful year. It not only brought us Trump as president elect, but on a more personal level, we lost lost four pets that year among other things. COVID alone probably makes this year worse. So here we are again near the end of an atrocious year without water. Life is just grand.

When we bought this house, over 15 years ago, it was our one concern. The previous owner only lived here one year and they had a problem with the well. They said they had accidentally left a hose running for a long time. This was a concern we decided to overlook because we were in love with the house. I write this on my back porch overlooking apple trees, towering sugar maples and blackberry bushes just crying for me to come pick more of them.  No complaints here.

A few weeks ago, we noticed a flutter in the water and a few faucets were producing rusty water. July was dry so we were concerned. We started doing a better job of conserving water and bought bottled water for our personal consumption. The problem went away with about seven inches of rain in August.  Last Saturday, the last weekend in August, the six year old complained that he couldn't flush. Of course, we didn't believe him until we tried and realized that there was no water anywhere in the house. Not this again! 

We have a beautiful five acre lot in northern Vermont on a very tall hill in the outer foothills of Mt. Mansfield (the largest of the Green Mountains). The dirt in my yard is only a thin layer and below is bedrock which is very hard. This is probably why the well is over 500 feet away from my house. Drilling a new one would be very expensive and to be avoided if we can. 

When I was a kid, I used to spend the summers in a cabin in Southern RI, near the beach, that did not have running water. When we went to the bathroom (big bathroom), to flush we went to the river with a bucket and then poured the water into the toilet.  No biggie. Some city folks will deal with a lot of bullshit just to get out of the city. Bottled water wasn't plentiful back in the 70's so we'd bring a huge jug from home. When that ran out, we went to the local cemetery and refilled. We took "sponge baths" at home and sometimes showered at the beach. . Since we were kids and our parents only went there when they weren't working, it wasn't that big of a deal. We had no place to go in a hurry. Being on a work schedule like that we would really suck. 

Back to the present, while we waited for the water situation to be fixed here, at the end of COVID summer, we did similar things. It was like being at the cabin of my youth. We don't have a river nearby but we had a friend who was on vacation who told us we could shower at her house. Wherever we could find water, we filled up, keeping a bunch of empties in the car. We have a dehumidifier that supplies us a big bucket of water each day (for the flushing). Bottled water is placed throughout the house along with hand sanitizer. We use paper plates and heated up water on the stove for whenever we needed It is a temporary situation, no more.

We hoped it wouldn't be six weeks like last time. Rainfall doesn't fix a situation like when it gets this low. The water table eventually gets replenished in the fall when the leaves start falling from the trees. After the leaves are gone, the trees release water preparing for the winter. Fall was still a few weeks away at this point.  

Monday, August 31st: Last Monday morning, I called a water hauling company to pump water into the well but when they showed up they did not have the equipment to go that far. The plan was to pump 4500 gallons (or whenever it is filled) of water into the well. We would basically be pumping water into the spring as a temporary fix which would allow us to have a reasonably normal life for a few days until I get the well fixed.  The quote I received was only for $285.00 so I thought this was a good deal.  If only they could reach the well. They only had 400 feet of hose. They agreed with me, when we looked into the well, the water was below the pipe that feeds to the house.

While they were here. I asked them about another problem we had. The pump that brings the water into the house was making a really awful noise. We googled this the first time, years ago, and know that you can damage your pump if you continually run your pump without water, so we had to turn it off.  Here is the problem: there is no off-switch. We had to turn off the power going to the pump which means a circuit breaker. The problem with this is that the breaker controls several plugs in the house. With it turned off, we lost the internet, the television in the living room and freezer in the cellar. We had extension cords running around our house. This is not a good thing when you have a six year old. They figured out how to disconnect the pump by removing a wire from it. This made life much more bearable. No more extension cords running around the house. We referred me to pump guy because there was nothing wrong with our well. 

Tuesday, September 1st: On Tuesday, the well guys showed up.  Of course, they bashed the work of the people who installed the pump back in 1984 when the house was built (I assume). Not up to code.  The pipe that I saw in the well, that is above the water, is the overflow pipe. It is supposed to be that high.  Phew! They also laughed at the guys I had at the house the day before.

They diagnosed the problem: I needed a new pump and they be back tomorrow with the pump.

Wednesday, September 2nd: Wednesday the water problem was fixed. A new pump was installed and they plugged it into the wall so we would not have the power problems if we ever had to turn it off in the future. Cost $1750.00. 

*YAY WATER*

But wait, "what is that puddle?!" After the water started flowing, a huge puddle accumulated on our basement floor. Water was shooting out the bottom of our water heater tank. The guys showed me how to turn the hot water off and suggested I call my plumber. I called the plumber and didn't hear him back from him until around 8pm.  He said it sounded like our water heater needed to be replaced. "Blah! $ Blah! $ Blah!"

Thursday, September 3rd: I spent the day calling water heater companies. It occured to me that I was probably going to spend the Labor Day long weekend without hot water, but at least we had water. We could flush, drink and cook normally. Again, not ideal, particularly during a pandemic. I found the receipt of the water heater that we bought in 2008. This was the first major purchase we made after we bought this house, $2k. I called the company I bought it from, an elderly man answered the phone with a dog barking in the back. "That's me," he said, "but I retired years ago." He gave me references to people who couldn't do the work for another two weeks. I found a guy on our town forum that sounded great but when I called him, he was on vacation in Wells, Maine. Nice guy. He referred me to Falcon Plumbing. They could not make it until Wednesday, September 9th.  Deep breath, okay. As I write this, that is tomorrow. 

Wednesday, September 9th: The water heater guy just left. We need a new tank, as expected. He quoted me $3,800.00, roughly, for a 75 gallon tank. But we could save $700.00 by going to 50. Since we barely use hot water in this house (wash dishes and showers for two and a half people), a smaller tank sounds reasonable.  We talked about a waterless tank but it sounds like a headache and is more expensive.  He'll come back tomorrow first thing in the morning.

Thursday, September 10th: I got up early in case he came super early. At around 12:30pm, he pulled in. I should have known better. Total cost $3,300.00. Totaling with the pump, I am down $5k. 

I showered. It was glorious!