This small inconvenience created by my dying water heater brings to mind my grandparents. For most of their adult lives, they did not have indoor plumbing. Consequently, they had to draw water from a well to use for cooking, drinking, washing, and for watering my grandmother's plants and garden.
Their well house stood a few feet away from the gate that led to the main house. Each morning my grandmother would go to said well house and use the pulley to lower the long, metal well bucket down until it hit the surface of the water below. Once it was filled to capacity, she would pull it back up and flip a lever to empty the water from the bucket into the empty metal buckets she had brought with her from the house. The number of trips she made back and forth depended on how much water was needed for the day. When weather permitted, she'd store water on the front porch in huge, silver wash tubs and use it accordingly.
As kids, me and my sister took many a bath in those big wash tubs. Oftentimes, the water was too hot or too cold and we would lament as my grandmother tried her best to scrub us clean. Some mornings, however, when she was too busy or just tired of hearing us grumble, we got lucky and only had to suffer a quick wipe-down using a wash cloth, a bar of soap, and a pan of water she heated up on the stove top.
Did we appreciate the effort it took for her to actually get the water for all of those baths? Probably not. We were kids and we didn't like baths, regardless of where the water came from. Also, we were chronic complainers, which didn't help. But clean or dirty, gripes and all, my grandparents let us visit as often as we wanted and in the process, we created wonderful memories that will never wash away.
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