You replace a faucet set on one of your sinks, the old one having ceased to function. How many times have you changed the washers on it, each time like throwing the tap handles little lifesavers, hoping they could hold on and not sink, like Jack in Titanic?
That shiny silver finish, sparkling like a diamond in the sky, so long ago. Ah, but that was then. Now it’s pitted and scratched. Craters on the dark side of the moon. Plus, the plunger doesn’t hold water in the basin anymore, so that needs replacing as well.
After you crawl out from the cabinet beneath, aching and cramped, you think about how when you first put the parts in, they’re shiny and new, and even though you polish them over the years, in time a water spot or two leaves a little mark, a thin-rimmed memory of itself. Its molecular footprint.
Sadly, that little stain is a lonely one needing other water spots to join it and leave their essences behind in a gesture of solidarity. How they congregate, aggregating in an aggravating manner experienced acutely by the DIY plumbers of the hardware store haunting world.
Why can’t water spots stand solo on their own two hydrogen feet? Or be OCD about cleaning up after themselves?
Nope, they’re a gregarious bunch and love to party hearty, like real ragers. So before you know it, despite your best efforts to hold back the mounting horde, the finish on the faucet, the handles, all of it, head for hell in a handbasket.
And you know you’ll live with that, for a time, just as long as you can tolerate witnessing the creeping demise. Eventually, though, the realization comes with mounting distress that the faucets face nothing except a more and more tawdry future.
You know it’s not like you can hit City Mill all the time and buy faucet set replacements. Well, some people could, but not retired folks depending on just a pension and/or Social Security. Keep installing new ones? Forget about it.
You are resolved, then, to shine and polish up this new set every time you use it.
You solemnly swear this oath. Just as you swore you’d keep your new car looking pristine. Like a New Year’s resolution.
Lanning Lee 