My terlet whistles when it’s flushed.
Not the sputtering, low whistle like when you’re calling your dog with your mouth full of crackers but a long piercing whistle like you’re trying to get the attention of your friend Johnnie down the block.
The mystery of the whistling terlet started Sunday night after the warehouse lumber and hardware stores were all closed. My husband, Juan-Too-Many-Thumbs, has a policy: Never start a plumbing project when the plumbing parts stores are all closed. As much as I agree with that policy, it made for a long night.
You see, I have lots of things that make me lie awake at night - Christmas is less than a week away, I have an operation coming up the week after, and we’re contemplating building a house. And I’ve noticed it’s not just me awake for what feels like hours on end. Juan-Too-Many-Thumbs isn’t snoring as much or as loudly at night as he used to either.
What does this have to do with the whistling terlet? Well, it’s hard for a woman to wake at night without needing the services of said terlet. I usually resist the pull of the commode, not through stubbornness or laziness but because I know getting up will only make sleep move even further down the clock.
Knowing how hard sleep is for me, Juan-Too-Many-Thumbs usually gets up quietly during the night with only the creak of his knees alerting me he has risen. But last night, due to the mystery of the whistling terlet, when he got up, he turned on the faucets of both the tub and sink in our terlet room before he flushed, trying mightily to alleviate the whistling so it wouldn’t wake me. And it worked. No whistling. Only it made the terlet room sound like a CD of Niagara Falls.
And you know what the sound of running water does to a woman!
