April 1, 2002
DOWN HOME:
Plumbing skills go down drain
___The half-bath faucet proved to be my Waterloo.
___"Replace faucets in bathrooms" topped my to-do list when I took a few days off while Lindsay and Molly were out of school for spring break.
___We were thrilled when we moved home to Texas six and a half years ago. Joanna and I were delighted to come back to the Lone Star State, the place of our births and upbringing. We were excited to live near family again and to be close to longtime friends. I was pleased to work with and relate to Texas Baptists.
___And we were flat-out tickled to buy a new home. Enough of somebody else's dirt, carpet selections, wallpaper and fixtures.
MARV KNOX
Editor
___We moved to Lewisville in south Denton County, which was--and still is--booming. New subdivisions sprang up like dandelions after a spring shower. So, we bought us a new house.
___Of course, we accumulated our own dirt, and the dining room carpet got stained within a few months. We still have the original wallpaper, but we've painted (OK, Joanna has painted) about all the walls. The place is well broken-in, and we feel blessed to call it home.
___But the faucets were the first fixtures to break down. Who'd think faucets would corrode and the finish would chip off in chunks?
___We've got two sinks in our bathroom, one in the girls' bathroom and another in the half-bath by the living room.
___Did you know a fairly normal, reasonably adjusted adult male can spend an entire day installing three new faucets? I started in our bathroom, since we had a backup if I messed up. I learned on the first one, and then the other faucet in our bathroom and the faucet in the girls' bathroom popped in perfectly.
___Next came the half-bath. The faucet pours into a pedestal sink. Sounds great, huh? No tight cabinets to crawl around in. Just wide-open space on the bathroom floor.
___Except for the space where the hoses and fittings and bolts all go--about the size of Jiminy Cricket's back pocket.
___I shut off the water and took off the hoses. But since I don't have an extra elbow two inches above my right wrist, I couldn't for the life of me get the bolts loose.
___At the end of the best plumbing day of my life, I went to bed feeling defeated.
___So, we called our friend Larry the Plumber, who--no doubt--has just the right tool and know-how to fix that faucet.
___I've since decided life is a lot like my plumbing endeavor. We can get so consumed by our failures and disappointments that we don't appreciate our successes and blessings. And sometimes, we've got to turn our problems over to someone who can fix them. God's grace is sufficient, even when we meet our Waterloo in a faucet for a pedestal sink.
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