Before the first hundred years, plumbing was much simpler. My father either flexed his muscles and used the plunger or called the plumber. Then, I became an “independent woman”… meaning I was either on my own or too broke to do anything but fix it myself.

There were so many things I had to learn, putting a clutch cable in a Volvo being one of the more interesting, but I wasn’t really good with cold water and squidgy carpets.

Then we decided to find a place without carpets and mice in the walls and four of us rented a house in North Hollywood. The house had many good points, the hardwood floors being one of the major ones. It had come to the point where we were really thinking about buying the place. We’d even put earnest money down on it. A couple of weeks later, the owner decided not to sell-VA took too long to suit him so he sent the money back

That Friday night we came home to find that the bottom has rusted out of the hot water heater. Water was all over the kitchen and creeping toward the hall, the living room and beyond.

We called the landlord but there was no answer and something had to be done, now. We talked it over and decided to head over to the local appliance store. The landlord could take it off the rent.

We brought a shiny new water heater back to the house (with the wrench we’d bought for the occasion) and carefully read the installation directions. They didn’t seem overly complicated. Turn off the gas line, turn off the water lines and use the wrench to remove them from the old heater. Put the new heater in place, hook up the lines and mop the floor… again.

OK, we got the gas line and the hot water out line but we were having a little problem with the water intake line. One of our housemates stepped up to help and overestimated the amount of force needed… Suddenly, we had a major water spout coming out of the wall.

Keep in mind that it was a Friday night, there was no answer at the landlord’s number and to top it off, we had no idea where in hell the water shut off for the house was located. And all the while the water was heading down the hall…

Cheryl ran outside and got the hose. I grabbed the duct tape and we managed to divert the flood out the back door while the third roommate caller water and power to come out and shut it off.

The nice man from Water and Power showed us how to cut off the water and was polite enough not to laugh about the duct tape. Now all we had to do was figure out how to get the water into the heater even though the break in the water pipe, inside a lathe and plaster wall, was about six inches lower than the top of the tank. We couldn’t even see where to put in a new pipe. It was almost midnight and we were cold and wet and very tired. Moping a large kitchen floor for the enth time will do that to you. Bedtime.

I’d kinda hoped that the whole thing was a dream and the rusty water heater would be back in place with no broken pipes. Hopes are created only to be dashed. It took all four of us to haul the old heater out to make room for us to work.

I remembered my dad and grandfather working on old pipes. “We need to get a couple of pipe fittings and find some place to rent a tap and die set up.” The rest of the family looked startled, than skeptical. Cheryl shook her head. “We aren’t plumbers. It’ll never work.”

“We fixed the Dart and the Volvo. What’s a pipe against that?”

Cheryl shrugged and we piled into the car headed for the nearest plumbing supply place. They had the parts and rented us a tap and die. We hurried back to the house to get our project going. The parts guy had recommended Teflon tape instead of the goo dad had used and that sounded better to me, too. What he hadn’t said was that it was very thin and fluttered. Did I mention that we had cats?

The second roll was handled more carefully and several hours later we had a neatly wrapped pipe attached properly to the nice new hot water heater and the water to the house was back on. All was well…

All was well until a few days later. We got a frantic call from Harriett. No, it wasn’t the water heater. A car had run into drive wrecking her car and proceeding to take out the corner of the house.

We moved.