THIS HAPPENS ALL THE TIME!

Today our very excellent floor installer (I say very excellent because the floor looks great but for…) came to inspect his work from the summer, after I complained that the boards are separating. The separations are such that I can almost hide letters and manuscripts in the emergent cracks. I’m no contracts expert. I stick with torts. In fact, I proudly announce to my torts class that tort law triumphs over the law of contract again and again (i.e. no matter what you signed away on paper, you cannot exculpate yourself from liability just by your say-so). But I do know one thing: when we purchased the new floor, we bought ourselves a promise of beautiful wooden floor boards, neatly aligned, one next to the other. The gaps were not part of the deal.

Still, when I called the installer, he told me that separations are natural. They happen because we keep our houses warm in the winter and the absence of humidity creates the great desire for boards to huddle into themselves. Mine were just huddling, and would unhuddle come summertime. But he offered to come out and take a look in case it was more than just a predictable huddle.

I turned up the humidifier, sent the dog to another part of the house (diminishing the possibility that the installer would point an accusing finger at something other than his work) and waited. The installer came early, shook my hand in a convincing, assured way, and inspected his work. A big smile came to his face. He looked up and said “this happens all the time! We get calls daily in the winter from surprised customers! We tell them the boards are just shrinking (I prefer the term huddling) for the winter. It’s just so warm and dry now! No, this is nothing to worry about. We stand behind our work. Your boards are okay.”

It seems to me that these are attractive words that he used, and I would like to use them too. For instance, say the Dean calls me and asks why, by the beginning of Spring Semester my grades have not been turned in yet (in case I really get stalled with the grading). I answer “Don’t worry, Dean, this happens all the time! Law profs here are notorious about handing in late grades! Remember when one waited until Spring break to turn hers in? Hey, I’m sure you get calls all the time. It’s the same thing! I’m just late, that’s all. You’ll get them eventually”

Or, maybe I could call up the slogan when I fail to report income for tax purposes (say blogging suddenly turns profitable), or when I show up late for class, or when I take up too much space with my over-head luggage, or when I fail in whatever I routinely fail in, for all the reasons why we all fail repeatedly, all the time.

Anyway, I shook his hand and we parted, amidst my mumbling something about putting in yet another wooden floor in the living room in the future because we just love his work (and we do, but for the emergent cracks). It reminded me of a day when I was 16, in Poland, standing in a very long line at the post office with my boyfriend (that is perhaps an overly optimistic characterization of his status vis a vis me), and the teller decided to take a tea break just as it was my turn. I, being not one to argue, meekly went to the end of another line. My “boyfriend” looked at me and said “oferma zyciowa!” (you Warsaw types will appreciate this; in English it roughly translates to something like “life’s loser”). I took it to heart then, but today I guess I was in a more forgiving mood.