QUARANTINED FOR 14 DAYS Wayne Roderman, MRWA Resource Conservation Circuit Rider When the phone rang late Saturday afternoon, I figured it was one of the kids calling, but after hearing the inflection in my wife’s voice as she answered, I knew it was not the kids and there was something wrong. This was our conversation after she hung up the phone: Wife: That was the county health department and they have quarantined me for 14 days! Me: Why? Wife: Because I passed Marissa at the post office on Thursday and she’s tested positive for COVID-19. Me: But you didn’t stand and talk with her, you only said ‘Hi’ and ‘How are you?’ in passing. Wife: Evidently that’s enough for them to quarantine me and I have to stay in a completely different room from you, too. Me: Am I quarantined, too? Wife: Not according to the health department, just me. Me: That doesn’t make sense! If you were exposed on Thursday and we’ve been together for the last two days, that would make me exposed also, so I’m going to selfquarantine! That was the gist of the conversation and for the next two weeks, my wife stayed in the back part of the house and I stayed in the front part. That left me sleeping on the couch and doing all the cooking! Now, I’m not saying I haven’t slept on the couch before, but I didn’t even do anything wrong and it seems like I’m being punished! Of course, I suppose my wife felt like she was being punished on the day I prepared her breakfast and then went out to my shop and worked until 6 pm that evening before I came back into the house and started preparing supper. She did let me know that she expected to be fed a little more often than that! Truth is, sleeping on the couch wasn’t
punishment, but not being able to hug and kiss my wife was! And, not being able to hold my grandkids, hug my kids, or socialize with any of my family or friends, definitely felt like punishment! If this was the ‘new normal’, I was not fond of it! However, I understand the need for social distancing to prevent the spread of this virus, so for now, I am not shaking hands with people to introduce myself and am praying for an end to this madness.
You hear the phrase new normal quite often, but, let me say there are some old normal things still around. One of those is the amount of power it takes to pump water. Most of the time, the power used to pump water is electricity, and the national average cost of electricity to pump water is $.50/1000 gallons, or, $500.00 to pump 1,000,000 gallons. Again, this is the national average, but I know for a fact that in southern Missouri, it costs approximately $350.00 to pump a million gallons of water so it could be higher or lower for you, depending on where you live.. Over the past few months, of the water leaks I’ve located throughout the state, two separate communities stand out. I assisted both with locating their leaks and, both communities repaired the leaks and saw significant decreases in their electric bills. The first system I would like to discuss was a small POA (Property Owners Association) with approximately 50 meters. Soon after a change in management during a MoDNR sanitary survey, they (continued on page 20) 19
