To Flick That Thing

 

Just sat and worked from early till late.  A dull sense of accomplishment as the cabal of to-dos assembled before you are laid low, one by one.  But there are reinforcements and just as your day is ending those folks on the other side of the planet are suddenly responding to all the things you tossed them earlier in your day. 

 

I was glad, therefore to welcome Ryan to the house.  In the middle of a long slog it was my wife who notified me that someone was at the door.  Portly, bald with a beard and benighted with confidence and some ability to gab, Ryan introduced himself, said “no thank you” to coffee twice and lead the way with me in-tow down to basement.  Once again I was there, confronting the array of copper tubes that resembled the subway map of a large metropolis. 

Ryan looked around.  Felt different pipes.  Asked me a few questions, some of which I could answer.  He asked if our water had a lot of calcium.  I knew our water had stuff and that we had things to try to adjust this.  He flicked a the lever on a little diamond shaped hub and flicked it again.  “There you go.  You hear that?  The warm water’s flowing.  That ought to trip the boiler.”  Sure enough, the furnace kicked on.  “Yeah.  That’s the water feeder.  You just have to flick that thing to loosen the calcium build-up.”  Huh.  Cool. 

 

Certainly, one and then another pipe seemed to be getting warmer.  He also counseled me schedule an annual cleaning wherein they’d replace my low-water-cut-off device which was dripping.  But this was a not a pressing emergency.  I also needed to cut out and install a “T” to purge the system of the errant air that was in there, confusing the system into thinking all was sufficiently warm. 

 

Learned a lot from Ryan.  Including where it was he lived, which is up in the Catskills.  Raised in Hyde Park, he’d moved up and out to the Catskill Mountains.  He kept referring to where we were as “down here” and I began to consider it from his perspective.   “You know where the Neversink Reservoir is?”  I hadn’t.  He names a few other towns that I cannot place and my mind’s map can only extend from 55 out towards Ashokan Reservoir and he is describing something in between which I can only generally surmise.  But he speaks about them all with brio and he makes me curious as to why I don’t already know about these places.   Ryan keeps talking out in our driveway.  He doesn’t seem to want to go.  We learn about his high school experience.  And I sort of don’t mind as I know what’s waiting for me once he’s off and on his way.

 

 

 

Wednesday, 10/14/20