My Brain Is Being Drained By The Plumber

Florence J. Mauchant was born in Paris, France and has been a New York City resident for the last 20 years. She has lived in different abodes in France and the United States and currently works as a financier as well as a social entrepreneur. Through all the moves and career iterations, she never stopped writing. Her latest series of relocations (three in as many years) and the decision to build a house in a Vermont village has prompted the writing of “My Plumber is Draining my Mind”, an article which is part of a book to be published later.

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My brain is being drained by the plumber

Or how to imagine a yet to exist house when one’s brain has been emptied?

It is the first week of July, the city of Manhattan is oddly empty, the sky is spotless blue and the sun is providing just the perfect amount of warmth. Instead of being uplifted by these auspicious elements of my summer environment, I feel like I have been flattened into a thin, energy-less form, by one of those road roller machines that I imagine, one day, will be of use in the construction of my house in Manchester, Vermont.

I have just come back from a tiring two-week trip dealing with German post-construction issues for the tiny apartment where my daughter has settled in Berlin, returning home with a list of issues yet to be solved. I crave going back to my New York office responsibilities, blissfully stretched between financial spreadsheets and the nursing of my new Social Tech start up but no…I learned upon arrival in Manhattan that the Vermont plumber needs to be seen ASAP.

I plead with myself; the upcoming 4th of July week-end is flirting with my intense desire for a respite from all these construction demons but the foundation of my long dreamt about house is scheduled to be poured the week after and guess what? We need to know where all these pipes, gas, Wi-Fi, phone, electricity, water (the clean kind and the other kind) are going to be placed. Did you ever know that so many conduits are needed to feed a house?

And, even though I had studiously reviewed and approved the Vermont plumbing plans with the architect prior to my German building duties trip and decided on six different zones with air induction for the whole house -except for the electric radiant floors of the bathrooms-, there has been a change in the decision paradigm. I need to come, hear it and well, if I am not too dense, revise my decision.

It is Wednesday, July 3rd 5:30 a.m. The alarm does not have to ring. Thanks to the jetlag, I am all ready to go. I drive the 207 miles north to the town of my future home. Interstate 87 is the easiest and quickest (by 6 whole minutes according to Google Maps) path to Manchester, VT but not the prettiest. However, the I-87 option eventually rewards you when you reach the New York/Vermont frontier on Route 7, just after the sign “Welcome to Vermont”. You negotiate a wide and long curve and at its end, are abruptly faced with waves of gently powerful mountains, an intensity of nature which results in a deep, visceral breath and an instant feeling of peace.

From this point on, my doubts about my move from the 8 million residents, world-envied metropolis – which I have called home for the last twenty years- to a 5,000 soul village will progressively melt as this magnetic mountain chain has me in its clutch, pulling me down toward my new home.

So, when I arrive in Manchester where I am supposed to meet with Mike the plumber, I have forgotten the battles in Berlin and the sacrificed 4th of July weekend. I am intent on the wonderful opportunity to be educated about pipes, heat and the complete HVAC issues (so proud to master this acronym). Five minutes after the start of the meeting, I am toast. The first three minutes were about the usual introductory pleasantries and then Mike, who I have been made to understand is the top plumber in the area, digs eagerly into the subject. I am impressed by his stature: a tall, somewhat sturdy man, carrying the expected beard (blond in his case) of most genuine Vermont men. He has intense clear blue eyes which do not leave my eyes when he starts:

“I am a history buff and I always like to share with my clients that radiant heat was actually invented by the Romans. Since then, however, you have a few updated techniques, especially when you start with a new, empty house…” He pauses and smiles to make sure I am following his pun. I appreciate that he is trying to ease me into the subject. “…so your options nowadays are either electric or hydronic radiant heat. Electric radiant heat is not the best economical option on an ongoing basis even though the initial installation cost might be less. So I suggest we focus on hydronic radiant heat systems”.

I silently thank my Greek teacher for drumming into her reluctant 6th grade student the key Greek roots: hydro means water. So Mike is talking about water and heating…uhh yes?

Mike goes on, unperturbed by my frown of desperate concentration:

“Hydronic radiant floor heating systems use the liquid as a heating fluid that can be heated by using any fuel. In your case it will be propane gas. The system will use the well water, which will be heated by a boiler. The hot water will move through the tubing network –imagine a web of resistance cables- and then it returns to the water heater for reheating.”

I interrupt because I have captured one word that I recognized: “boiler”. Mustering my most nonchalant tone, I ask:

“What are the options for the boiler equipment?” I have added “equipment” to sound more technical but I see by Mike’s raised eyebrow that I have missed my target.

“There is only one top brand out there which will live longer than the both of us, and that is HTP; their 1,000 metric cube boiler is just what you need”. I happen to have my computer with me, ostensibly to take notes but there are only a few words on the top of page one. They all have that annoying red undulating line underneath them. While Mike continues: “ducts would be placed mostly in the basement”, “96% efficient boiler with returned water”, I aim for safer territory and google “HTP”:

“HTP’s residential space heating boilers provide ultimate comfort and the best overall efficiency ratings while keeping maintenance and operating costs to a minimum”

I am pleased by the soft assurance of this sentence, smack in the center of the HTP home page, and the limpid words “maintenance” and “cost”, blissfully associated with “minimum”. As I have embarked on this crazy project to move closer to nature, starting with an empty but mountain-view- rich lot, the worries about the cost of this enterprise have grown. A smile of relief comes over me. Mike believes I have understood his last point, smiles in agreement, and relaxes for a few seconds. He then carries on with his seemingly logical next point.

“There is one inconvenience with hydronic radiant heat which in the last few years has been mitigated by connected systems such as Nest. I estimate, that once you turn the hydronic radiant heat system on, it will take about five to six hours to heat your home to a comfortable temperature during winter. However, you will be able to program the desired heat way ahead, wherever you are traveling whether you opt for Nest, ecobee of even Alexa.

Mike seems to have intuited that even though I am claiming this future home as my haven, my long-term respite from a world which does not seem to leave me time for essential contemplation, I will not be able to alter my current lifestyle. Meaning, I will still have to travel many times a year, and for several week stretches away from this new home. What he has not computed is that my earlier request to him for the installation of a manual water pump (or even two) is rooted in a concern toward our society’s unrestrained reliance on technology. So his assumption that heating my home will be dependent upon my access to Wi-Fi is producing an instant and solid resistance. Especially as I just learned that last year China launched thirty-eight communication satellites carrying rockets compared to our thirty and that the US is losing big time in the race to space domination and potentially as well to a secure access to wireless communications.

While my mind is meandering silently about geopolitics issues in the Milky Way, Mike is deeply buried in the basement of my home and in the conscientious reassessment of its mechanical room. I remember that the size of this questionable room (how does home sweet home rhyme with mechanical?) is already as large as my library underneath which it will be nested. But Mike thinks that has to change. With the seven zones (yes if your own brain has not been drained, one zone was added by Mike), the recirculators, regenerators (the list of foreign words makes me feel like I am back in Berlin), the mechanical room as it is planned will be a packed, confusing area with many dials, knobs and levers. Mike pulls a picture from his phone of one mechanical room he is candidly proud to have designed. It looks to me as overwhelming as a cockpit, except indeed a very large cockpit, larger than my library.

I look at Mike. He pauses. I am confused and, also, scared. There are too many items I am not understanding about what will embody my home. And I will be the captain of this vessel. Is it too big for me? Large, ferocious doubts clog my brain, which has no energy left to respond to these attacks.

I look at the big blue eyes of Mike and his sturdy, working hands. I remember him telling me he has lived all his life in this village that I am strangely so attached to since I discovered it only a year ago. I also have noted Mike’s enthusiasm, his obvious passion for learning about the new techniques of his craft, long-distance-house-heating included.

I can relate to the facts about Mike’s life path. I can feel the passion. I respect the unrelenting thirst for improving one’s skills. I might be in known territory, after all, the one of shared values and of trust.

I stand up and extend my hand toward Mike.

“Ok Mike, let’s go with this hydronic radiant heat marvel. It sounds perfect for my future home.”

By Florence Mauchant

From: United States