Life Stories and Beyond

A Bathtub of Hurricane Prep Water?

By Lisa Batten Kunkleman

What do you do with a bathtub-full of water after the danger of hurricane force winds has passed? Do you pull the plug and watch it glug down the drain, serving absolutely no purpose except to give the pipes a little rinse?

No siree, not in our house. We learned an awful lot about rationing water when Hurricane Hugo crashed through Charlotte in 1989 leaving most of us powerless. In our case with well water, no power means no water.  For nine days with neither power nor water, there’s no way my husband, Dan, and I could let that much water go without serving a purpose. I know that sounds silly to many people but surviving with just a few large pots of water  to brush teeth and take birdbaths really stuck with us.

      

When last week’s storms threatened, we filled a bathtub and double-checked the plug since when we filled a tub before Hugo, we didn’t know our drain plug leaked. Once the most recent threat of high winds and power outage passed, we left the late 60’s purple ceramic bathtub-full of water for about a week, knowing our dogs would eventually need a bath. Call us crazy but it was a good idea. Bath day finally arrived so I washed the dingiest two of our three dogs. Okay, the smelliest two .

        

 

Their reaction was priceless. Neither of these two dogs is fond of baths. But this time, they stepped over the side of the tub and into the foot high water like it was their idea. I suppose they are more afraid of shallow water than deep water. Maybe I’ll find one of them snuggled up in that tub wishing someone with opposable thumbs would fill it for them to have another hot tub experience.