This Old House

For this phase of life, that's the deal.

The first time I noticed water pouring from the ceiling in our dining room, I stopped myself because I couldn’t believe it. I just stood there, staring at the chain that attached the light fixture to the ceiling, watching water sprinkle down each oval-shaped link.

“This can’t be happening,” I thought. But happening it was.

When I walked upstairs to the bedroom and bath immediately above the dining room, I found the cause right away: my daughter had been in the tub, splashing water all around. As I’d figure out, the drain overflow wasn’t working, allowing water to leak below.

Maybe if everyone in the house was aware, I thought, that would put a band-aid on the problem for now. “Make sure you’re calm in the tub and don’t move around too much,” I told her. That would work, right?

So it did… for a little while. Months later, when we were having Christmas eve dinner in the dining room, I happened to notice a small wet spot on the ceiling, right around the same spot I’d seen the water trickling from before.

Inside, I sighed. There was nothing I could do about it at that moment, so I decided to just forget about it for now, and enjoy my holiday with my family.

But a week or two later, I looked again. The spot was a little bigger.

I was busy, it was the new year. There was too much to do with getting the kids ready for school, myself for work, seeing family, you know the drill. And another two or three weeks passed.

One Saturday afternoon, I took another look in the room to check out the spot.

This time, it was even bigger.

I got on a chair and reached up to feel it with the tip of my finger; sure enough, it was wet. My fingernail happened to catch a piece of the ceiling and tear it away, sending tiny pieces falling like snowflakes onto me.

I knew, I knew, I knew I needed to call a repair service. I knew this needed fixing. But I told myself it was too expensive for right now; it could wait. It’ll hold up for now… right?