dyeing my soul

This morning, I was reading a book that quoted Marcus Aurelius as having said: “The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.” For me, this is true. On a bad day, if I'm not careful with my thoughts, I can have stained my poor soul all the hues of a gangrenous rainbow before midday. There are people who are glass half full people and those who are glass half empty people. If I allow myself free reign with my thought life I can be a "this filthy glass is half empty with tepid water that stinks of sulfur," person. I don't want to be that person. I don't want my children to learn from that person. In a combative effort I've adopted the motto: "Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."

Please don't get me wrong, this doesn't give me an instant Pollyanna outlook (BTW Pollyanna gets a bad rap. Read the book, she has the right idea.) that renders my whole life lollipops and raindrops but when I catch myself focusing on the negative, I try to turn my sights on something better. It helps.

It's not necessarily easy. Take, for example, the Case of The Disabled Dishwasher. My dishwasher has been on the fritz for approximately six months...maybe more if I am honest. I'm not exactly sure when it started but the dishes just stopped coming out shiny clean. Then they started coming out with scummy white residue. Then the dishwasher itself started getting greasy build-up the kind of which one might find between the teeth of a person who has not been acquainted with a toothbrush in a fortnight or in the ears of a child who never met a bar of soap. I was reluctant to call Sears for a service repair for a few reasons:

1. that loathesome time window that presupposes I have nothing else to do with my life.
2. the inevitable lecture blaming my poor maintenance for the resultant appliance failure.
3. I have avoidance issues.

I hoped that if I ignored it long enough, it would get better. Surprisingly,this magical thinking didn't work so I tried troubleshooting the thing to death. I concluded that the water was just not getting hot enough. Maybe the heater was broken? Finally I became desperate enough to overcome my reticence—I just wanted my clean dishes. So I called the Sears service center and made an appointment. Of course, the automated robot voice gave me a appointment window for a Friday between 8am to 5pm. Not an auspicious start. I waited all day long and the guy never showed. He called at 7:30pm to say he wouldn't make it but would put me on the schedule for Saturday...unlikely. Didn't happen. After several aborted reschedules, he showed up the next Wednesday.

Can somebody please explain to me whether there is a special class at appliance repair school called "How to belittle the appliance owner 101". Before the sentence, "I think something's wrong with the heater," was out of my mouth, my new friend had dismissed that notion with a flip, "If it was the heater, this thing wouldn't be running at all." Okay, I guess I was wrong. He then proceeded to tell me that he wasn't familiar with the Bosch brand and had never seen my particular model. Additionally, he had no repair manual for this model, blaming the "Information Nazis" at Bosch for deliberately withholding their schematics. He then launched into a didactic about the history of the dishwasher since the late nineteenth century, while never once touching my dishwasher. Seriously? At this point, I began opening the dishwasher and gesturing at it and even taking off the filter and one of the dishwasher arms as if to say, "Please feel free to follow suit." No takers.

After peering into the airgap and making a few unfruitful phone calls, he told me that my water was just too cold because the dishwasher was located on an outside wall. He advised me to run the hot water until it was scalding before running my dishwasher because the Bosch heating unit was inadequate to heat my water sufficiently. I had already tried this little nugget of water-wasting wisdom as advised by my owner's manual... to no avail and told him so. Shrug. I tried to show him the build up of scum throughout the unit and he responded, "Yeah that's pretty gross." Shrug. At this point I felt tears of frustration building up. He added, "Ever try Dishwasher Magic? That should help clean the gunk and I have a special on it today for only ten dollars a bottle." So desperate was I for any result, I almost said yes. I made a quick pitstop at my computer and checked the internet for comparable prices. Lo and behold, several sources were offering this dishwashing miracle for only five dollars...for the same number of fluid ounces...hmmmm. When I declined his amazing bargain he stated, "Well, I don't know how I'm gonna get you outta here for less then $129."

Pause.

Deep breath.

Pause again.

"When I made the appointment with Sears, they told me it would cost $75 to receive an estimate of repair. Why would it cost more?" He sighed and rolled his eyes, "The $75 is just for me walking in the door." Um HELLO, ALL YOU DID WAS WALK IN THE DOOR!!!!!! I just stared in silent disbelief. After several minutes of a staring contest, he said, "Well if you want the $75 dollar offer, you'll have to decline my estimate." Your estimate? WHAT ES-timate? I continued to stare until I finally found my words, "Um, yeah I'll be declining your estimate." Even the $75 was galling.

If there are any readers out there, I bet you are wondering how this story has anything to do with my opening paragraph. How is this me thinking on the noble, right, pure, admirable? You're right, it's not. I am getting there.

The unrepair job happened in mid December. After that, every time I neared the dishwasher, I just wanted to smash plates to smithereens in violent protest. I wanted my glass half smashed. I was bemoaning my dreadful fate to a friend when she told me about a guy who had fixed her Bosch when her heater broke. She looked in my dishwasher and told me, "Oh yeah, that's what mine looked like." She gave me the company's name: Dunn Wright (if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area write this down- it's a name worth knowing) She told me, "My guy's name was Bruce and he was awesome." Awesome? I don't know this Awesome you speak of. I practically ran to the phone. That's a lie. I was so afraid of a repeat of the last repair debacle that I delayed and delayed and delayed. Did I mention I have avoidance issues?

Finally I just couldn't stand it anymore and I called the folks at Dunn Wright. My friend's guy, Bruce, came the very next day, early in his three (yes, only three) hour window and listened to what I told him. He then proceeded to dismantle my dishwasher where the other individual had never even lifted a screwdriver. Within twenty minutes he had discovered that the circuit board that tells the heater to heat was short-circuited and I would need a new one. He ordered the part, came back in one week and installed the item. He charged me $224 for the two visits and the part. Now my dishwasher works to perfection: sparkling clean fabulousness, HOT out of the dishwasher.

So here's the thing, what if the guy from A&E factory direct, the maintenance company contracted by Sears, had fixed my dishwasher in the first place? I definitely would not have been so frustrated, I wouldn't have wanted to punch him in the skull, I wouldn't have spent a month struggling with my ridiculous avoidance issues. On the other hand, I am so wildly grateful for the fact that my dishwasher is finally fixed. I practically skip to the kitchen these days. I almost want to kiss each dish as I take it out of the washer. So, maybe I'm not exactly grateful for the useless ripoff of my first encounter with the Sears guy but without him, would I be as appreciative? Right now, not only is my glass half full, it's completely full with a pretty party parasol on top. Excellent. I'll think about that.