Everyday for the last week it is rained here in Texas. The never ending drizzle and pop up storms have made quarantining even more soggy by keeping us completely indoors as we social distance. It’s like Mother Nature stabbed us with the COVID-19 knife and then twisted it with the bad weather.
This week, on Thursday morning, as our household started to come to life, my daughter mumbled to me that she had a leak in her ceiling. With all the rain we have had I was not too surprised to have a leak, just annoyed. I did find someone to come out right away to the house and check out our roof.
Our roofer was puzzled. He couldn’t find a leak anywhere and called in an assistant to help him look. I figured the leak was due to the massive amount of rain that had been falling. I started mentally removing a few zeros from the bill I was about to pay. That is about the time I started to hear the dry heaving coming from my attic.
The two men came down the attic ladder to give me the good news that I did not have a water leak. Instead, I had a raccoon infestation and the leak was not water but instead the raccoon’s family bathroom seeping through into my daughter’s room. That is about the time I started dry heaving. It was literally raining shit from my ceiling!
I gladly wrote a $100 check for turd removal and handed the poor man a Sprite for the road to settle his still churning stomach.
Like I said, it’s been raining in Texas.
As a country, we have all had a long week. It’s amazing how fast we went from figuratively having a leaky roof on Monday to leaking poo and dry heaving on Friday. We don’t know why this has happened to us and don’t know when it will end.
We do know that some of the smartest people on the planet are working around the clock to find a treatment for the sickest patients and to find a vaccine to help all of us. There is progress and we will move past this even though that is a small consolation today.
Right now we don’t want to be quarantined. Our kids are already over being home schooled. Most adults are ready to return to their offices and hope they have a job waiting for them when that time comes. Everyone wants to see toilet paper, bread and eggs when they walk into their grocery store. Going through the unpleasant is never fun but being uncomfortable is the catalyst of change.
“There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” ~C.S. Lewis
I hope that’s true.
The trash panda remains in my attic as I write this. She has babies and trapping her is a death sentence for those babies which is another issue. So we wait without knowing how long. Just like the rain that is still falling outside, it’s out of our control.
This wasn’t how I thought this week would end. I guess even the raccoons who are social distancing in our attic are short on toilet paper. Being able to laugh at everything going on is the only thing we can do.
The moral of the story? “Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass, it’s about learning how to dance in the rain.” Just make sure it’s actually rain before you start the music.
Erin Has Something To Say 