Water Matters

Yesterday Phil was working on the final detailing of the pump house, when Martin Bush called. Martin ended up coming over to sight in his rifle, and he and Phil ended up talking for most of the day. Phil was in college when he met Martin, a little 8-year-old, youngest child of Doug and Denise. Now Martin is married, and settled in Charlottesville.

I watched them interact from a distance. And I was so thankful that Phil had a man to hang out with. He’s talked to Dennis a few nights while I’ve stayed back with the children, but it wasn’t until yesterday that I realized that he used to get together with other men about six times a month, whether going to coffee with Tim or men’s Bible study with the Hillsiders. I think that survival has been so pervasive a concern, the less immediately important things, like interpersonal relationships, have been put on hold. Maybe it’s time to rejoin humanity. Or maybe we’ll wait until we have running water, but after that, we’ll have no excuse.

Because of all the hanging out, Phil didn’t quite finish the pump house. So he woke at 6am this morning, while it was yet dark, and did his morning routine: feed and water the chicks, make coffee, read the Bible. When the sun rose, he went up and did the final touches on our adorable pump house by the time the rest of us woke up.



We’ve been trying for a week to get in touch with our excavator guy to come and backfill the trenches we’ve had open for the last three weeks, as well as dig more trenches for the other two hydrants. It got down to 26 degrees last night, and Phil is worried that our pipes will freeze. So he called Butch at about 10:30 this morning.

Butch was here within the hour. He and Phil dug ditches for six and a half hours. It was 6pm and very dark by the time they were finished, but they got the job as done as they could. Tomorrow Phil hopes to install the two remaining hydrants.

I will say, Phil has a vision. I liked having the water running in the hose down to the garden, but I still had to fill the watering can, because the hose itself was not quite long enough. Well, today I tapped into the water line close to the barn, and was able to water with my fine Haws watering wand. It was so, well, normal, to turn on the faucet and use the hose.

What used to be a normal part of life has become so miraculous, it’s worth writing home about.

(Parenthetically, speaking of the miraculous: at Bible study, I washed my hands. When I turned on the tap and the water came out warm, I stared at it in disbelief—warm water, at the turn of a handle. And then I laughed at myself—I had forgotten about such fine accommodations.)