When we first purchased our house, an engineer inspected the property and reported “You may have a wet basement, the back wall looks suspicious.” We asked the sellers about it and they replied, “If our basement was wet, would we make a room for our daughter down here?”
We felt secure. After all, what type of parents would let a child sleep in a wet basement?
Apparently, the kind that wants to sell their house.
Our first February saw a record snowfall, and when the big melt occurred, it melted into our basement.
But all was not lost, as we were industrious (and desperate). We went to Sears and bought a wet-dry vacuum, we elevated all our possessions off the floor, and we became aces at the art of bailing out the flood-waters.
Year after year, we prepared for the rainy season and mucked it out. We endured and we were happy — until this past winter’s record snowfall. That’s when the bailing hit the fan, ending whatever bliss we were in.
There was no keeping up with the flow. Night after night, the more we bailed, the more came in. At one point I thought, “Maybe we should build an ark and try to save two of everything.”
We had reached the limits of our tolerance, and needed to find a repair company to stick its finger in the hole.
It took us a few months of getting estimates but we finally decided on Mr. Brickman Weather-proofers. Our next difficult decision was to whetehr go with a French drain and sump pump or repair the cracks, from either inside or outside the basement. We thought long and hard, we relived each and every moment of sucking up the deluge and we made up our minds — No more Mr. Nice-guy Mr. Brickman. We chose them all.
Mr. Brickman came in June. He dug; He channeled; He installed; He fixed in and out. When he left he gave us his guarantee — “Your basement will be dry even in the event of a tsunami.” Feeling secure, (fingers crossed and everything still elevated) we waited for the rain.
The summer progressed and there we were, French-drained, sump-pumped and fixed cracks living through the driest season in history.
Until this past weekend.
The rainy season had finally arrived and dumped about 10 inches upon our cracked and parched city.
Would our basement remain dry as promised? Would Mr. Brickman be right?
By Sunday afternoon, we could no longer stand the suspense. The time had come to go down and check. On went the shoes, breath held, step by step we descended. Reaching bottom we turned on the lights and looked around. What did our wondrous eyes perceive? The driest basement in all the land.
Not for Nuthin,™ I love my husband, but Mr. Brickman gave me a dry basement, and ended a wet weekend with a ray of sunshine.
Jdelbuono@cnglocal.com
