I can feel Hollywood executives rolling their eyes already.
"What is it this time?" they ask. "What are we being blamed for now? The unrest in Baltimore? School shootings? Homosexuality, teen pregnancy, the rising cost of kale? What?!"
You are being blamed for my undoubtedly-very-expensive-8pm-on-a-Sunday-house-in-the-middle-of-nowhere-emergency-plumbers-visit. I don't have numbers, because I haven't gotten the bill yet. I'll forward the damn thing to Pixar when it arrives.
Why is it their fault? Finding Nemo, A Turtle's Tale 2, Flushed Away. Movies aimed at children, wherein some creature is flushed down the toilet to safety. Admittedly, they are cute stories. Top notch. Big name actors, big money in the theaters, very popular on DVD and Netflix.
But seriously, guys. Have you ever even met a kid?
Here's how the whole thing came about:
Plumbing problems have suddenly become a really big deal in my life. The initial issues cannot, I'm perfectly willing to admit, be blamed on Hollywood. The problems that led me to be on a first name basis with a plumber, the kind of relationship, in fact, where they answer my phone calls with "Hello, Darcy"...those issues can be laid at the feet of the house-flippers who remodeled my home.
One night, several weeks ago, I discovered sewage backing up into the shower in the kid's bathroom. When BJ got home from work, he snaked the drain, things started running again, and we thought we were good to go. However, the next day, when I drained the bathtub, Bryn ran out of her room, screaming that there was water coming in. When we tore down the ceiling, BJ noticed a few things that didn't look right. We called a plumber, who told us it was likely an easy fix, and stopped over.
I knew, by the look on his face, that it was NOT an easy fix. He looked like he would have rather been anyplace else in the world when he told us that the plumbing was an absolute disaster: wrong types of pipes, wrong (or non-existent) venting, held together with caulk rather than plumbers putty. His advice? Pull it all out, and start over.
So we did. The poor teenager lost all her privacy, moved onto the couch, and had all her belongings stashed in the basement, for lack of a better option. Ceilings were pulled out, holes were hacked in drywall, new pipes were installed. Contractors were called...and called....and called. Plans were made to repair ceilings and walls, paint was purchased, carpet picked out. We thought the worst was over. I heaved a sigh of relief, certain that things would start getting back to normal, and my plumbing trauma was over.
I was wrong. Once again, we started draining the bathtub, and someone ran out screaming. This time, it was BJ, running up from the basement. This time, water wasn't coming from the ceiling, but from the floor. Panicked calls were made to the long-suffering plumber, who hitched up the trailer and started for our house. I tried to resist the urge to yell at small children who were attempting to go on about their toddler-business while we attempted to manage yet another crisis.
When the plumber arrived, he and BJ vanished into the basement with some sort of equipment that took both of them to wrestle down the stairs. I heard clangs, cursing, and, suddenly....laughter. BJ came upstairs with a bright yellow, plastic fish.
I recognized the damned thing: I'd pulled it out of the toilet several days prior. At the time, I thought it was rather funny. Sam had just watched A Turtle's Tale 2, which featured fish that wanted to be flushed down the drain to the ocean. Shortly afterwards, I had found the toy in the toilet bowl. Since he had just dropped it there and hadn't made any attempt to flush it, I just laughed, pulled it out, cleaned it, and told Sam not to put toys in the toilet. Unfortunately for me, that had not ended it. Sam had, evidently, decided to take it one step further, freeing his beloved fish forever.
Explaining to a three-year-old the workings of modern septic systems in a land-locked state is an exercise in futility. Especially when his new favorite movie has made it completely clear: "All drains lead to the ocean, kid!"
So, Hollywood. Disney. Pixar. All of you. A plea from the heart of a mother: NO MORE FLUSHED FISH, OKAY?!?
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