The other day in the freezing weather, I decided to go to my hardware store and buy a new filter for my furnace. I’m using so much electricity and my electric bill is going up as we speak. I thought maybe a new filter would help. I also called the electric company and asked if I shouldn’t be turning the heat down to 60 at night as it takes so long to heat up in the morning. She asked how high I kept the heat, and I told her 72. She said I should keep it below 70! Is she kidding? I asked her how come the electric bill goes up every January – where are all the cuts that were promised after the ENRON debacle? So she says that was a long time ago and there have been cuts. Apparently I must have been asleep when that happened because every January they add more reasons to raise the rate. Since I was wasting time talking to her, I headed to the hardware store.

It was so cold that I took two hand-warmer packets that you shake and little particles inside the wrapper heat up and stay hot for hours. I put them in my pockets and away I went. I got the furnace filter and then stopped in a market right across the street from the hardware store. Each time I go in, there’s a big stand-up sign on the floor that states: Piso Mojado. I always think it means someone just pissed on the floor. So I finally asked the produce man what it meant. He mumbled something about wetness, so I told him what I thought it meant. He laughed and agreed with me. “Caution! Wet Floor” is the actual translation I found upon checking. So why don’t they just say that? It doesn’t make me feel too secure when I go through the produce section with Piso in the back of my mind. And what if I slipped and fell in it? I came home and my hands were still warm from the hand warmers. In fact, they stayed warm well into the night. How do I know? Because I was still clutching them after I turned my heat down to 60.

So I took the front panel off the furnace and put the new filter in, but I couldn’t get the panel back on like it had been. There are four screws to put in, and I did get three in but the fourth didn’t seem to match up with the hole. I was standing on a stool, trying to look in the hole with a flashlight and then match the screw to the right place. I’d drop the flashlight on the floor, get off the stool, pick it up and get back on the stool. Then I’d drop the screw driver on the floor, get off the stool, pick it up and get back on the stool. I worked on it a very long time. I wondered why I didn’t have a man around who would do those things for me . . . and then I remembered. I finally quit working and left it with just the three screws fastening it. Some day I’ll try again.

By then I was exhausted, so I sat down with a glass of wine to relax. I imagined myself back on the pond in my rowboat, relaxing with no worries of screws in the furnace or piss on the floor. But a dress in a rowboat? What was I thinking?