I have the best job. This morning, I was sitting across from a 6-year-old for 1 1/2 hours. I was doing some testing of his learning. He was adorable and the information I am gathering will be very helpful in keeping him happy and adorable. Right in the middle of testing, my landlord knocked on my office door. I didn’t answer it because the kid was RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE of doing a timed test. Rob came in, anyway, and apologized. He let me know that there was water in the lobby and that he was taking care of it. I masked my annoyance and he left. I continued with testing.

I knew about the water. I had seen it when I entered the building on the ground floor. There were also fire trucks in front of the building. I saw fire fighters talking to a contractor in the lobby. I gathered that the contractor, who is doing renovations on one of the condos in the building. had messed something up that needed fixing by the fire department. I asked one of the officers if it was okay to enter the building and he said it was so I tromped up a flight of stairs to the office. My landlord, Rob, came by shortly after I arrived and told me that the contractor had accidentally put a hole in the sprinkler pipe. Rob looked around our suite of offices and everything looked fine.

After testing was finished, I walked out into my waiting room. The large throw rug was gone as was one of the couches. There was an industrial grade humidifier running along with a bunch of fans. One of the ceiling tiles was wet and bulging. “Ah, I guess when Rob told me that there was water in the lobby, he meant the lobby of our suite,” I realized. Reid, the contractor, came in shortly after that, introduced himself, and let me know that he was responsible for the damage, including, buying a new couch if the one we had could not be dried out. The couch and area rug had been moved into a vacant office suite to be dried out.

Imagine that? There was a flood around the corner and people were taking care of it while I was able to complete my work for the morning. Then I just worked while the fans and humidifier were on. I got so much done that I’ll be able to take half of tomorrow off. I know that there will likely be things I have to do to resolve this issue. I have to say, though, that it is so nice to have this problem, if only just for today, taken care of. I don’t have to solve every problem. What a concept!

My landlord, Rob, came back to my office after I was done testing. He apologized again for interrupting my session. I said, “Well, now I know why you had to do it! I thought you were talking about the downstairs lobby.” He and I have a nice working relationship. Rob was so relieved that I was not furious about the damage. He noted, “You’re always so happy.” (I’m not, obviously, but I got his point.) “Rob, thank you for helping with this. The contractor looks like he is taking care of things. This is just inconvenience and my suffering about it doesn’t help anything and would just make people feel bad.”

When I feel like I am working on a team to solve a problem, it is so much easier for me. It’s so much better than going it alone or worse, getting stuck solving the problems that other people could solve themselves.