Warming Up to the Gremlins

From SpouseBUZZ by To the Nth -

The day after Sampson departed for his current deployment, I took a wary look around the house and held my breath for a moment. All right, I wondered, which major household system will cease to function now that he’s gone?

I didn’t have to wait long to meet my very own pet deployment gremlins, as they took up residence in my furnace about a week later. At just about the time I was hearing about Sampson’s adventures in various exciting and picturesque ports, I was scouring the Internet for HVAC tutorials in an effort to become an instant expert — or at the very least, a non-ignoramus — in what could be making my heater work sometimes, but not others. It was driving me crazy, but being a typical independent-minded (read: stubborn) military wife, I didn’t want to call anybody until it was blazingly obvious that I couldn’t come to my own rescue on this one.

It stayed cold, and my heater failed to miraculously heal itself. I found myself with my cell phone in hand, staring at the number for our across-the-street neighbors, a civilian family of folks who have been ceaselessly kind to us since we moved in. When they heard Sampson was deploying, they made me promise to call if I needed anything at all. They were busy people, though, and surely they had better things to do than look after me.

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