On February 1, 2018, I discovered that our water had been shut off. It happened in the wee hours of the morning, when most people were sleeping. This made me very anxious, in part because we were in the midst of a horrible flu season.
I posted a series of tweets about this annoying experience on Twitter, and later decided to post it here (with additional information added.)
It’s almost 2 in the morning, and I’ve got two shouty people outside yelling at each other. I’m working on a blog – not trying to sleep – so they didn’t wake me up. They are, however, setting off my PTSD.
It’s two-thirty am, and the shouty people returned. Guy is wearing a headlamp, and the lady is holding a flashlight. Walked quickly through the alleyway of the mobile home park. Odd.
And now, they are leaving. The guy is using a cane to walk with. I have no idea what they are doing.
Several hours ago, I tweeted about two people walking through the mobile home park in the dark with flashlights. Turns out it was the park managers, who shut off water for, I assume, the entire park.
I noticed that the water had been turned off around… 2:30 am. Most people were sleeping. So, the majority of the mobile home park woke up to no water. I figure that impacted people’s ability to get ready for work/school.
The timing of the water shut off meant that no one had time to prepare for the sudden lack of water. Last time this happened, the park managers went around and warned people BEFORE shutting off the water. Couldn’t do that this time.
So, now we have a mobile home park’s worth of people who can’t access water, and who won’t be able to for an indeterminate amount of time – during the worst flu season since 2009 (which was swine flu).
The park managers put a note on people’s doors letting them know that the water was turned off because a pipe broke. Doesn’t say when the water will be back on. Note was a copy of the one they sent on December 22 – the previous time a pipe suddenly broke.
The CDC says one of the most effective ways to prevent catching the flu is being able to wash your hands. Entire mobile home park can’t do that with the water turned off. We have elderly people here, cancer survivors, and people with bad immune systems like me.
I’m one of the people with a terrible immune system. Got 3 chronic illnesses that are auto-immune diseases. Pollen count is 7.6, which means I can’t safely leave the house and go somewhere else until water is turned back on.
And, thanks to my terrible immune system, leaving the house is going to put me at a higher risk of catching the flu that’s going around. I’m already fighting allergies, which means my body is already depleted, and my risk of catching the flu – which is airborne – is higher.
If the park owner, and whomever she hired to fix the broken pipe in December, solved that problem back then, this would not be happening again today. Instead, we have broken pipe and lack of access to water AGAIN. approx. a month after the first time it happened.
Lack of access to water means everyone in the mobile home park can’t flush their toilets, wash their hands, take a shower, brush their teeth, wash their dishes, or easily give water to their pets. There is no way to know how long we will be without water – and that makes me very anxious.
Tomorrow, we are having someone come out to start the process of remodeling one of our bathrooms – which is necessary because something broke. Unrelated to today’s water shut off. Still waiting for someone to fix the front porch steps, which deteriorated during the rainy season.
I just want things to fucking work like they are supposed to.
Across the street from the mobile home park is one of those do-it-yourself car wash facilities. Guy over there is spraying his car with a hose. Looks like whatever pipe broke ONLY affects us poor people in the mobile home park for some reason.
It’s 11:30 – which means my mobile home park has had the water shut off for 9 hours now.
It’s 12:30 – and our water has been shut off for ten hours now.
Its 1:30 – and the water has been shut off for eleven hours now. Just talked to a manager. He showed me where the water pipe bust. There’s a guy working on it. They need a new part. Manager says water will be back on in an hour – hour and a half.
For those who were wondering – yes, the water was finally turned back on. It happened while I was asleep because the Benadryl knocked me out.
Water Shut Off During Flu Season is a post written by Jen Thorpe on Book of Jen and is not allowed to be copied to other sites.
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