Just Pick Up the Phone

Today, while writing out my schedule on my weekly calendar, I added “Call the appliance man” to Monday’s block – an innocuous enough task. I mean, how hard is it to pick up the phone, dial ten numbers, and schedule an appointment to have your stove fixed? Well, let me tell you — it turns out that it must be a feat of monumental proportions because as I flipped back through my calendar, I realized that I had written down this little reminder on the previous Monday, as well as the Monday before that, and the Monday before that. Did I mention that our oven has been broken since March?

Now let’s think about this for a moment. My dear friend Anne would defend my honor saying something along the lines of, “You’re a very busy person — you have food to buy, people to take care of, laundry to do — just to name a few things!” Anne, as you can tell, is a very, very loyal friend. If we’re being honest, however, we are all quite aware of a little something called coronavirus quarantine, which has now lasted, in case you have lost count, for about four months. Did you hear that, people? FOUR months. So, while yes, I have been doing all of those fun-filled activities that Anne would so graciously give me credit for, I haven’t been doing a whole lot else, except maybe for walking the same two-mile loop in my neighborhood five times a day like a hamster on a wheel trying to escape the monotony of her cage. (Anne also knows a great deal about hamsters — mostly how to lose them in her house.)

So, what is wrong with me? Why can’t I pick up the phone, call the appliance man, and make the lousy appointment like a responsible adult?

Ah, maybe herein lies the problem. Maybe, my dear friend, I am not a responsible adult. I mean, if I’m being totally honest, my brain tells me that I am not the fifty years old that my birth certificate would indicate. Au contraire! My brain tells me that I am a mere twenty-three — which, I’ll admit, is an age at which many people are quite responsible. (I, however, was not one of those fortunate beings.) Adding to this self-delusion is the fact that my kids often tell me that I have the maturity level of a 5-year-old. Well, I guess that explains everything. Have you ever seen a 5-year-old call an appliance man, ask him what the code F19 means on her oven, and schedule a service appointment? Me neither!

Okay, maybe that excuse is a tad over-the-top. So, if it’s not that I’m too immature to make the call — although the jury is still out on that one — then maybe it’s that I find the task too mundane. I mean, who really wants to spend their time calling the appliance man, no matter how nice he might be? (Ours is quite pleasant, I might add.) But if the tediousness of the chore were the issue, then my house would be filthy, my children would be running around in dirty, stinking clothing — especially the one who works at the barn with horses all day in 90 degree heat and humidity — and we’d all be staring at empty plates at suppertime. So, I don’t think it’s because the task is too boring.

Perhaps I’m just tired of calling the said appliance man. In the sixteen years we have lived here, he has worked on three different ovens eight times, two different refrigerators five times, three dishwashers six times, and two washer/dryer sets a combined total of 52 times. (Okay, that last one might be a slight exaggeration, but you get my drift.) I mean, the poor guy must think I have the hots for him and that I purposely break our appliances just so that he has to come out to the house. (Don’t worry, he’s a little too old for my taste.) So, yes, I am growing a tad weary of having to call the appliance man and hand him over yet another check only to hear him say in his sweet, southern way, “They sure don’t make appliances the way they used to. Used to be these machines were built to last.”

I’m really not sure why it has taken me so long to call about our oven except possibly because the top, mini-oven works just fine, so why bother fixing the bottom one? That will, of course, change once Thanksgiving looms into the picture because I don’t think the turkey will fit in the mini-oven. I know! I’ll just write the phone call on my schedule for the Monday before Thanksgiving; that way I will absolutely have to pick up the phone and make the appointment. Not a bad idea, if I do say so myself.

Hey, thanks for listening and helping me figure this out. Oh, and by the way, a little tip from my appliance man: you really don’t need to add as much laundry detergent to a load of laundry as the bottle and the washing machine manual claim you do. It turns out that the washing machine manufacturers and the detergent companies are in cahoots. Who knew? See, I told you he was a nice guy.

Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash