Things They Didn’t Tell You in Little House on the Prairie

One time when I was frustrated with my life in Phoenix (A haboob hit right when I finished cleaning the house) I called my mother in law and asked is there dust in Arcadia. She must have been having a day similar to mine because she declared it to be a life similar to Little House on the Prairie.  This became my research reference when we decided to move to the family farm.

Thus far the material in the book served only to scare the bejillies out of this gullible daughter in law. Well, this morning a vain woman’s worst dream came true.  As I was washing my hair, the water stopped. When I say as I was washing, I mean there was a lovely shampoo bouffant atop my head. The water pump made a horrible, horrible noise and the water ceased to flow. Stunned, it took me a long minute to discern the reality of the situation.  The pipes froze. The house is 68 degrees and the weather outside is -11. The average of the two is still freezing weather. We aren’t getting water anytime soon.

Google, helped with the solution for the pipes. Electric blankets. Thankfully a solution was on the horizon. It did get me wondering what Pa would have done, they didn’t have electricity in the books. I was willing to wait with shampoo in my hair for the water to melt. Then I got a great idea.  I bet if I put snow on the stove and melted it that would make enough water to rinse the shampoo out of my hair. Laura Ingalls Wilder got a mental thumbs up and out to the snow I went to return with two bowls of prairie potential. This blog was supposed to end with me saying hurrah to Little House on the Prairie and hurrah to me for reading the entire series.  After taking one look at the melted snow, hurrah became ew, and gross, and I’m not putting that in my hair.  It turns out that snow isn’t as pure as it appears.

My patient husband watched the events unfold.  When we got to eww.  He simply asked, “Now will you listen to me and use the bottled water?” We have 15 gallons stored for just in case. I thought the rule was just in case only happened when you didn’t have the resources.

So here I sit with clean hair, a cup of coffee and a persnickety attitude and grumble to myself, “Everything was always clean in Little House on the Prairie” and “I wonder if my mother in law was messing with me.”

Aww who am I kidding? We all know I’ll start writing my book and forget these problems exist. On that note  I wish you a happy New Years Eve, eve.