RED CARDING THE APPLIANCES

The gas company is back digging trenches into my street.  They are in front of my driveway with the giant machine-powered jackhammer device, and for hours and hours and hours the sound echoes through the house and my brain.  It sounds like the crew is sitting with me in my living room, jackhammering the shit out of my entire life.

It's a sound that I am used to after spending four years in the construction zone at school.  For months and months and months those giant machines broke open the ledge and annihilated boulders right outside my window at school.  This time, though, it's not about progress; it's about remediation of disaster.

The crew works until 11:30, maybe later.  I don't know because I fall asleep ... with my glasses on.  I don't remember a damn thing.

When I come home today, the crew has made remarkable progress.  I still park my car across the dangerous intersection and down the street because the metal plates are covering the huge gaps in the roadway.  I'm afraid that the car might fall in and ruin any progress on the road.  I look around and see no cars on my street anywhere and decide I probably assumed correctly that my road is still off-limits to any vehicle not connected to the gas company.

I enter my house, wondering if the gas company came around to make assessments today.  I left my landlady in charge, so I am hopeful that the crew came through.  I walk into the kitchen and immediately notice things out of place.  I look closely.  Hiding underneath the towel that hangs across the oven door handle I see a touch of red.

Oh, shit.

My gas oven has been red-carded.  I look further.  My hot water heater has also been red-carded, and my furnace is in various states of mutilation.  "Condemned" the signs say, and they're stuck to the appliances so no one, not even a moron, could mistake them for working machines.

Okay, so I won't escape unscathed.  I didn't truly think that I would, but I certainly hoped so.  I'm Pollyanna, apparently, going through life singing songs like "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life."  Not surprisingly, though, that song does have the words, "Life's a piece of shit when you look at it," so I suppose that's pretty fitting, too.

I may not have heat, hot water, cooking gas, or working appliances, and I am facing the gas company breaking through the field stone in the basement to reinstall pipes and other crap, but, hey, I have cold water and electricity!  I suppose it could be worse.  Not by much, mind you, but still.