At what point do you wise up in life? At what point does the great light bulb go off above the noggin and zap some sense into you? When do you stop becoming so naive?
When does it occur to you that what you might think is only a simple weekend project — “No problem, honey. I’ll be done in a couple of hours” — will really turn into an unending, epic struggle of man versus the project where only one of you will emerge the victor (only it won’t be you.)
I let a few cracks in the grout of my bathtub go over time because I’m not really that smart, don’t fully subscribe to the widely-circulated “myth” that running water can be damaging to walls, and generally don’t like to act on a problem until I’ve properly studied it over the span of about seven months.
I should also note that at the end of that seven months, I discover that damage from running water is definitely NOT a myth, and that I now have to spend another three months trying to figure out what in the heck to do now.
You can call it procrastination, but I like to blame household problems on a fumbling bureaucracy (even if it is my own).
These didn’t look like cracks that you fear, so I waited a bit longer to deal with the problem then I should have. I’m a big enough man to admit that that was probably not the way to go.
It turns out that water is attracted to cracks like rats to an open-air kitchen. And once it gets behind tile well, I’m sure you can imagine. Needless to say, I spent my Saturday in the tub, chipping off a couple of rows of tile until I outran the water damage.
If you’ve ever worked with tile, you know it doesn’t come off easy. Sometimes it does, and you rejoice. Other times it chips and cracks and sends pieces flying with such velocity that it shoots right through your body, instantly cauterizing the entry and exit wounds. (Another question: Why is it that even after a dozen of these high velocity projectiles have pinged off your forehead, you still don’t think to put on safety goggles, even if they are sitting there within reach?)
Some people hate tiling, but I sort of enjoy it. It’s easy once you have a nice, clean surface. But what’s not so simple is affecting a high traffic area like a bathroom, not to mention the one room in your house where the family cleans itself. Without a shower, you’re pretty much left with hosing off outside (and worrying the neighbors) or going without washing (and getting your co-workers worrying that you’ve started sleeping in dumpsters.)
But since I’m ingenious, I hung sheets of plastic across my exposed and un-sealed tile, making our shower look like a hazardous materials containment area. Remember that scene in “E.T” when they quarantined off the house in a bubble of plastic? That’s pretty much my bathroom right now.
It’s also crudely duct taped to the wall, and risks falling down at any moment, which could come as a great surprise to the unknowing shower-taker. Shhhh. Don’t tell my wife.
The weekend project has now drifted into the workweek. But I’m close — I’m really, really close to being finished. I have all my tricky pieces cut and fitted. I’ve attached all of the others, and soon I’ll be ready to grout, seal and caulk. I’m close.
But I’m just not sure what’s wrong with the human brain that I couldn’t see the obvious and come up with a realistic time-frame. Shoot, when you know it takes 24 hours between each step, and when there are at least three steps and only two days in a weekend, don’t you think that might have been some kind of clue!?!
Maybe I thought the space-time continuum would mercifully bend for me, or that simply by willing it done, it would be so. Beats me.
Maybe one day I’ll learn. And along the way I’ll know never to trust a bureaucracy and to always fix a crack if there’s water nearby.