New Shower Hose©

When our son was born my husband installed a shower hose. It was sleek and shiny with a long hose. It reached all the places I needed and had perfect pressure (just enough to get the shampoo out.)

Over the years it held up well. Then one night as I ran the bath I noticed a black murky substance spill in through the faucet. I drained the water and reran it. Ahh... fresh, clean water. I breathed a sigh of relief.

The next night the pattern returned and continued. I shortly became alarmed and imagined all sorts of theories: a) pipes had eroded and were leaching poisonous debris, b) the water supply had become contaminated and we had been drinking cancer-causing pollutants for months, or c) I had been imagining the black substance. (I knew I shouldn't have given up chocolate!)

My husband took ten seconds to look it over before declaring, "The shower hose is leaking mineral deposits." He pointed out that somebody (me) had never let the water drain from the hose before returning it to the nozzle.

"How do we fix it?" I asked.

"I'll buy a new one," he announced.

The next morning I greeted our cold shower tub with glee. A new shower hose awaited!

I blinked to clear the smeared mascara from my eyelids. The hose was white, small and plastic. Warm, clean water came out in a pleasing stream that was just enough to clean and invigorate.

The next morning in the shower I noticed dark material stuck under my toe. (It must have been caused by chasing my youngest child through neighbor's questionable side yard.) Well, that was easy to fix.

I pulled on the hose to reach my foot. In the previous day's gleeful state I failed to notice that the hose was only two feet long. By the time the water reached my foot it was no longer a forceful stream, but a tepid drip.

The next morning I experimented with the pressure settings. Our old hose had three useful settings. Our new one had two: pleasant and "circus" setting. If needed it could peel baked mud from an elephant.

The next day the nozzle head only pointed to the side. No matter how I twisted and turned, the head lurched sideways. I conditioned my hair wrapped up in the shower curtain for the next two weeks.

The following week my two-year-old discovered that if she moved to the top of the tub during bath time she was just out of reach of the shower hose. We took to dumping her lathered head with handfuls of water.

My son heard my complaints over dinner one night. "Can't you return it?" he asked.

"Aren't you sweet?" I smiled. (We don't return anything in our house. Once bought, it's lived with even if it's useless, doesn't fit or points sideways.)

I'll have to save future feet cleaning for the bath.