Dealing with alarm can be exhausting
- Laura Moore: Housebroken
- September 6, 2022
- 495
Houses are stoic structures; they have to be since they must deal with Mother Nature in all her various moods.
Houses much prefer calm days without too much sun with perhaps a light breeze. Our place is a tough gal and learned very quickly how to survive whatever outside stresses Mother Nature subjects her to. The one thing that scares our house, in fact it gives her the trembles, is the alarm installed inside her walls.
Our house came with a smoke alarm that also responds to excessive heat. It is super loud, and once awake, it screams like a banshee. When that happens, our house and the rest of us except Taller Half become frantic and panic. The dogs express themselves by noisily racing around howling and barking at the top of their lungs.
I try to remember to turn on the exhaust fan over the stove before running out onto the porch. Taller Half stays inside and looks for a cut-off switch. There isn’t such a switch. Instead, he yells curses at the alarm and orders it to shut off. Amazingly, that works, and eventually it does stop screaming.
It is a traumatic experience for all of us, our house included. That silly alarm will surprise us on occasion, usually when I forget to turn on the exhaust fan while cooking. And I am embarrassed to say I forget to turn it on at least once a month.
Our reactions to that alarm are still a frantic panic to rush outside. We have acclimated a little bit. The dogs still howl, Taller Half still cusses and I still head for the porch, but I do remember to turn on the exhaust fan before I run.