My water broke

The other day I was greeted by the news that at around 7 am an underground water main had broken just up the street from my apartment complex. Apparently at one point there was water gushing down the street making it look like a giant water slide. Since then the city had turned off the water to the area so they could fix the break.

So, do you know what that meant? That’s right, dozens of phone calls of the “Ummm, my water isn’t working… ummm, why do you have my water off… ummm, what’s wrong with the water?” variety. Evidently most of my tenants don’t watch the news (it was on there) and don’t bother to look out and see the cones and trucks and giant hole with the ladder sticking out of it.

That’s all fine. I don’t mind the phone ringing, even if I have to keep saying the same thing over and over. In fact it gave me the opportunity to harass one tenant who is behind in his rent. My answer to him as to why his water was off was, “Because you haven’t paid your rent. Without it we couldn’t afford to pay the bill and it was turned off.” “Oh, really?” he said sounding ashamed. “No, not really, dumb ass.” OK, I didn’t say dumb ass, but I thought it.

Another tenant came down to the office to see what was going on. After being told, he thought about it for a second and then said, “Does that mean I can’t use the washing machine too?” “Not unless you want to stand there and spit into the machine, but I don’t recommend that,” was my reply.

This went on all day until around 6 pm when the water finally came back on. Yes, it sucked. Yes, it was an inconvenience. It was no good for us either as we had to strategize going to the bathroom amongst my staff. Most of the tenants handled it in stride. In fact, all but one did.

If any one of you has anything else to say, now's the fucking time!

This particular tenant has been around for a while. For the most part you rarely saw her. She was quiet, polite, and kept to herself. The only strike against her is the ass-clown boyfriend who comes to visit her on occasion. He has a major case of little-itus (defined as a person who tries to compensate for being small in size by being big in attitude) and appears to have doing drugs on his list of favorite activities. Now, unfortunately, I think that lately she has joined him in this past time. All of a sudden she is looking very unkempt and has gotten into arguments with the maintenance staff.

This day I had already spoken to her earlier in the morning about what was going on. Then around 4:30 she came blasting into my office.
“Look, you need to do something about my water. I haven’t had no water and I can’t do nuthin.’ The room in another building has water, but I don’t. It aint right! I need to have water!”

I wasn’t sure what she was talking about with the other building. The most I could gather was that she had gone to one of the utility rooms and turned on a sink. When she saw a trickle of water come out as it bled through the system, she assumed that she was the only one without. The paranoia was kicking in.
“First of all, settle down,” I say in my usual calm tone. “I can’t help you when you’re yelling.”

“Settle down! I don’t got any water!” I’m not sure what the big concern was, it looked as though she hadn’t showered in days.

“I understand that, but as I explained to you earlier, water to the entire area has been turned off. None of us has any water. When I last spoke to Water Works they told me it normally takes them 7 to 8 hours to fix a main brake. That would put their finish time at late afternoon, early evening.”

“So, you saying I can’t have any water? You saying I can’t even have water trucked in or nuthin’? I want you to put in writing that I can’t have no water and you won’t truck any in!”

I didn't even want to know what she thought trucking water in meant. “I’d be happy to put in writing everything I know. I’ll even give you the number to call so that you can hear for yourself. If you’d like you can walk up the street and yell at the people working on the pipe, but I don’t think it will help,” I say, now aggravated, but still calm.

“I don’t need to talk with them, I need their supervisor. I just want you to write down that I can’t have water.”

So, I do. I write a letter, to no-one in particular, spelling out the situation in detail. As I am typing she is sitting in a chair across from my desk. She is rocking back and forth and says to herself, “Oooh, I need to take that kickboxing class so I can get rid of some of this ANGER!”

I finish typing the letter and hand it to her. She reads it and exclaims, “Oh, you wrote it all legal-like! I like that! I like a bully, it turns me on!” She heads out and slams the door on these last words. I’m not sure who she thinks the bully is here. I assume she means me, and I shudder to think I am turning her on in any way.

Perhaps I was inspired by one of Deb's recent posts, but I decided to say a little prayer. "Please God, help this tenant stay away from drugs. If it turns out she can't do this, please give her knee a loud popping sound so I'll hear her comming and know to lock the door. Ahmen."

The moral of the story is this:
1) Don’t get mad at someone who isn’t to blame for your problem, especially if that person is experiencing the same thing.
2) Don’t do drugs, kids.