VALLEY: Write place at the right time

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August 18, 2010

Anonymous The Journal-Register The Journal-Register Wed Aug 18, 2010, 08:23 PM EDT

MEDINA —

Whether or not you’ve noticed, this column has not been in the paper (or online) over the last few weeks. I took some time off — as I did last year — to vacation on the St. Lawrence River. There’s also another reason as to why it hasn’t appeared, but I’ll get into that later in the column.

Actually, the word “vacation” is misleading. One would expect relaxation to come into play when spending time on the river. But downtime, although it exists, is rare; full bore “kicking-back” is not standard-operating-procedure at our place in the north country. No sir, not at the “Labor Camp.”

But we’ve grown accustom to that … somewhat. We are still under the illusion that just possibly it won’t be as tough, it won’t be as laborious this time. There’s always that hope that we’ll have a little more free time each trip.

There’s no glamorizing it: The work is not a labor of love. As a matter of fact, it’s not even a labor of like. It’s just that the rare moments of respite that we are able to procure are precious. The serene glory of a sunset; the meditative sound of water slapping the shore. These are the things that make cleaning a septic tank by hand (almost) worth it.

After only three days there, we got hit with a storm that, according to year-round residents, was of proportions that they’d not seen in decades. Wonderful! We like being a part of history. Which we almost were — history — during a vicious lightning storm.

Due to the force of the hail and rain, an unused stove-pipe that protrudes about four inches from the ceiling started to leak. The pipe has been sealed off at both ends (below the ceiling and above the roof ). It’s never known to have leaked in the past.

No problem for Mr. Fix-it. As the storm raged, I grabbed man’s best friend and went to work. No, I didn’t stick the dog in the pipe. I used duct tape.

I spent the next 45 minutes carefully wrapping that sucker until the water no longer dripped. It wasn’t pretty, but I was looking for results, not a spread in a home-décor magazine. I used at least 3⁄4 of a roll. My smug sense of accomplishment was short-lived.

“Are you serious?” my wife asked. “That’s not going to work.”

“Apparently you haven’t noticed that not one drip has slipped by in the last five minutes.”

“Really?” she countered. “Apparently you haven’t noticed it stopped raining 30 minutes ago.”

“Trust me, I know what I’m doing.”

“And did you know what you were doing last night when I watched you for 20 minutes as you tried to blow out that solar candle on the picnic table?”

“You saw that, huh?”

“Yes. And I’m telling you that the mess you made with the duct tape is not going to last. It’s going to fall off and cause even more damage.”

“Fat chance!”

And so with the story told, I’ll finish with this little tidbit. The other reason this column hasn’t been in the paper? My laptop computer got ruined. I had no way to write it. It got fried as water gushed down atop the thing as it sat on a TV tray at the camp when … ah … the duct tape let loose.

And that’s the way it looks from the Valley.

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