This morning as I pulled warm clothes out of the dryer, I fell in love again with the used machine that I was able to buy after I had given up trying to fix my old one.
I'm a tomboy and everything, but not the kind that is good with tools. Still, I'm smart so when my dryer stopped working I looked at it and thought, "I'm a quick learner. I can figure this how. How complicated can a dryer be?" I knew of people who had fixed their own dryers, and I was confident that with some internet research, phone calls to fix-it savy friends, and a few trips to repair shops I could have that dryer up and running in no time. And for less than it cost to buy a new one! I was going to be resourceful and thrifty! I was going to cook dinner AND fix my dryer at the same time! I was going to be...SUPER SINGLE MOM! (triumphant horn blast)
Several hours and two trips to the hardware store later I was lying on the garage floor taking out a screw from the back of the dryer with a tool that I can't remember the name of but was having trouble with. I don't even remember what the working theory was about what might have been wrong with the dryer, but whatever it was required me to remove the back of the thing, take out a part and put a new part in. So far, unscrewing the screws and keeping them all together was proving much more of a challenge than I thought it would be, but worse than that was while I was lying there on floor I noticed old cobwebs inches away from my mouth. I backed my head as far away as I could. I guess I could have stopped what I was doing and swept them away, but I was making progress, I had already had to stop a few times to stir the spaghetti sauce and check the pasta, and I wanted to get this whole dryer business over with. Plus, someone had left the garage door open long enough for a swarm of mosquitoes to get in and they kept biting me while I worked. I imagined that this must be what it's like for an evil repairman when a dryer breaks in Hell.
Then a terrifying thing happened. Christopher came in to ask me when dinner was going to be done and my sister walked in behind him to ask if she could help - no that's not the terrifying thing, that's just the build up leading to it. Jees! Lemme tell a story already! Anyway, I asked Steph if she could check on the pasta.
"Ok," she said, and then she slapped her arm. "Man, that mosquito was huge!" She slapped at her other arm. "Oh my God, they're everywhere!"
"I know," I said. I let go of whatever tool I was using to slap the right side of my head and frightened off the little jerk buzzing around my ear.
"How are you able to stay in here?" Steph asked, smacking her leg.
"I don't know," I admitted.
Christopher's eyes went wide. "I'll help!" he cried. "You need a fly swatter!"
A minute later he was back heroically weilding a potato masher. He swung it at a black speck flying by. "I'll save you, Mom!"
"Christopher!" Steph scolded. "That's a potato masher!"
Swish! went the masher. "I couldn't find the fly swatter," he said, and hacked through the air again.
So this is the terrifying thing. When I laugh really hard, I become paralyzed. And watching Christopher race around the dryer swinging a potato masher and yelling "I'll save you!" while almost hitting Stephanie over the head with the thing was too much. I lay there, my mouth frozen open in an insane smile, laughing with no sound, unable to even let go of the screwdriver thingy, or to kill the mosquito that landed on my face, or to move my open mouth away from the cobwebs. I knew if I breathed in I would inhale them. This also struck me as funny. I laughed harder. I laughed so hard I COULDN'T MOVE OR BREATHE. And in that moment I knew that if I kept laughing at us I would die.
"Christopher," I forced myself to say. "Stop!"
""I can't! I have to kill them all!" He scowled at one. "Come here, mosquito!"
"Steph," I whimepered and laughed at the same time. "Please... make him stop!...Going to kill me!"
Stephanie only laughed harder.
"Please...help...spiders...I...hate...dryers."
I rolled over on my back. Somehow. I stared at the ceiling and felt the exhaustion creep in. Christopher's footsteps stopped and he peeked down at me.
"Mom?" he said. "I'm done killing them. Is dinner done?"
"HfgewrwnIwernwer wjguy2y17," I said.
"What?" he asked.
"Derwqeopurwrw01231nnawy," I repeated.
"Mom, you're mumbling and I can't undertsand you. I'm hungry."
"I'm buying a dryer," I said.
And I did, after I tried working on the dryer for a few more days. By the time I officially gave up I had bought two parts that didn't fix anything and spent many hours almost breathing in spider webs. But I did manage to get the back of the dryer off. I considered that a small voctory.
My new dryer is used, it cost less than what I paid trying to fix it myself and it's almost as old as me. But it works like a champ. I love that thing. Because I know that when it eventually breaks I will not fool myself into thinking that I can fix it myself. I look at that machine and think, "I will never ever have to work on you! If a repairman can't fix you, you're out of here!"
And I'm confortable with this. I'm comfortable with the part of me that is not good with tools, and does not want to inhale spiderwebs. I need never learn what a rachet or a screwdriver is or raise my potato masher in violence again.
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