Dark Waters.
Last night mud came out of all the taps. Earlier I had put on a wash of my son's irreplaceable T-shirts bought in Thailand, 'No, Nooooo - don't do that. What if they shrink?'. 'They are on 'cold' and I will dry them by the stove. Nothing can happen'. Da-daa! Cue for Fate to wake up and take an interest. Later I vaguely became concious of the distant sound of rushing water and discovered that the washing machine seemed to be on endless re-fill. Which continued even after the electricity was switched off. And of course meant that I couldn't open the door; behind which some precious T-shirts wallowed soppingly. Aaaargh!

Faint racial memories stirred and I turned the water off at the mains and managed to get the door open. But OMG, what is this? All the clothes were covered in MUD! I sneaked them away to the bathroom and rinsed quickly by hand. A few minutes later there was a shriek from downstairs, 'WTF ..... my glass of water is full of DIRT?'. 'What do you mean?' I turned back to the washbasin. Ah, right .. my tap too was running dark brown.

A soft blanket of total boredom and not wanting to bother to cope descended. 'Oh f@ck it. There's something wrong with the Spring'. I rang my husband. 'Hmm .. yes. It sounds like the collection chamber. It's probably worth your having a look'. 'Are you insane? It's dark here'. 'SO? Just take a torch and a crowbar to lever the cover off and then see if there's a leak anywhere'. Errr .....NOT ON YOUR LIFE. The 'chamber' is a whole spooky field away. 'Anyway - how come mud is coming through the taps? Why isn't it trapped by the filter?'. 'Filter? Ha, ha ... that stopped working months ago. Didn't I say?'. 'NO! YOU DID NOT! So we have been been drinking water straight out of the ground from a field full of animals?'. 'God, you're so squeamish. If you want a new filter then order one. Oh and could you turn off the feed to the swimming pool. I think I left it running'. Rings off casually.

The word AAAAAARGH!!!! in no way does justice to the screaming noise. He had driven away TWO DAYS ago leaving a water feed tap full on which we normally put on tricklingly for a few hours at the most. This had drained the collection chamber down to a bottom never normally seen by human eye and containing god knows what. AND this god knows what had been coming out of the taps and drunk by us ....

I made my son go out into the creepy dark and turn the tap off. After a couple of hours the water ran clear and I secretly re-washed the T-shirts. He hasn't tried them on yet because he trusted me ... How can a dull country life still manage to inspire a full range of violent emotions.. from fear to anger to revulsion to shame .. in just a few short hours?
- posted by Iris @ 5/13/2004 09:39:00 AM comment