By Jodi Rae Ingstad 

The toilet burped. That should have been the first sign for me to take notice that things were ready to take a nose dive.That husband of mine lay asleep when I heard the belch coming from the commode.“Pppst!  Husband. Wake up. The toilet just burped.”
It’s a liability this drama of mine.  It comes in handy when extra enthusiasm needs to be present to force change. But when you live with a woman of drama for too long it’s as if every little situation is a dramatic version of “The little boy who cried wolf,” only with female anatomy.
It doesn’t help that I inherited the genetic disposition of seeing everyday things as cartoon skits.  He doesn’t take me seriously because he knows I’m seeing it humorously and not in the real light of seriousness a toilet burp so rightly deserves. He didn’t jump up in a fierce gallop to attend to the belching receptacle. He just slept through it. It was no wonder then that I ended up yelling for him again. Not about the toilet burping this time.
I went to run a tub full of water to calm me from the knowledge that a new toilet was soon going to have to be paid for and delivered. That meant my bathroom was going to have to be torn apart and what woman likes to live with the headache of all that?
When I turned on the water to the tub I use two times per day I began to feel defeated. This is a mighty tub and powerful beyond measure. That water usually comes out with the force of a broken dam but not on this night. The hot water facet was on high but the water streamed out as if it was being shy or stubborn. I did what any other woman living on the prairie would do. I turned that faucet on and off then on and off again hoping it would fix itself. “Burp,” I heard the toilet in the next room say again.
I left the water running so hopefully it would soon be full enough for me to wallow in.
The temperature outside was mighty cold when all of this was taking place and we’d had problems with our pipes before. With Husband snoozing and me just wanting to take a bath,  I pondered all of the things that could be causing the burp and non-pressure of my water. I like to ponder and bathe at the same time.  I went back in the room with the tub to check on the progress of the water. It had only dumped just a pitiful amount of water into the large tub. I wasn’t even sure that it was enough to cover my ankles. The water was not hot like it always is so I did what comes natural and yelled for that husband of mine again. I yelled with the force of the same broken dam that the hot water usually comes out with and this time my drama worked. He knows that bath time is serious business with me because I do some of my best reading, thinking, eating and praying in there. He walked in and found me very partially submerged in the luke-warm water of the tub that usually holds lots of gallons. He deduced it must be the element in the hot water heater causing this peril on the prairie.
The temperature outside dropped. The plumber visited last night but still the water doesn’t heat.  He’ll visit again on Saturday with more parts.  For days I’ve been carrying in firewood to warm myself and for days I’ve been boiling water – lots of water– to bath myself. And you think you have it tough. (Tisk.).  Good thing I don’t drink or you’d find me burping just like my toilet does. Time to go boil some more water.