When I was little, I loved playing outside in the rain and I still love a good thunderstorm.
Of course, sometimes, rain interferes with my plans.
It makes things a little, well, inconvenient.
This was the scene last Saturday as high school cross country runners from our area competed in their conference meet.
Warming up....... and then, running
three miles
in 40 degree weather,
in pouring rain.
Saturday was the final race in the high school career of many of these young men and women, my youngest son included.
I learned a thing or two about perspective over the last several days and it started with this group of athletes. They competed, one last time, regardless of the conditions. When it was over, they chose to celebrate their accomplishments, and their friendships rather than to focus on the weather.
This was the scene in my basement,yesterday,
after the sump pump and the back up pump failed to turn on during that same rain storm
...and we didn't discover it for 48 hours.
The dark spots are where we walked on the carpet. The dark spots are caused by water
under the carpet. An inch or more of water
inside of our home.
In our finished basement.
Remember the exercise room that I just completed but hadn't revealed yet? Here are the before and after's.
I'm laughing as I say this...honest I am...
THIS is the "before" photo...from last night.
And THIS is the "after" photo...from tonight:
Don't you just love a "project" where the after photos are worse than the "before's"!? I also want you to know that the reason that I'm laughing is not because I've lost my mind. It's because we were lucky.
Lucky because, when we finished the basement, we built the base of all of the walls out of pressure treated lumber and because, even though we had never had water in the basement, we stopped the drywall (and the insulation) five inches above the floor then covered the space with eight inch tall baseboard, "just in case". This simple, yet purposeful, decision meant that no water reached the drywall or the insulation. We were lucky.
Lucky because three weeks ago, we cleaned out the unfinished part of the basement and put up shelves. LOTS of shelves; which meant that almost nothing was on the floor to get wet.
Sometimes, perspective makes all of the difference. Yes, there's water in my basement. Today, the insurance company sent a clean up crew and they tore out carpet and padding and trim. Yes, it's inconvenient and we lost a few things. But, it could have been so much worse. No one was injured. Nothing irreplaceable was lost.
You see, it's because of that same rain storm which made it messy for athletes to run and caused my basement to have water, that I noticed this as I watched sections of carpet being carried to the truck today:
My grass seed sprouted!
Thanks for sticking with me while I get a few things back under control! I promise that I'll be back to sharing creative projects in just a couple of days.
For today, now that the shock of it all is over, I'm working on my perspective.
xo,
