Not Really Helping Daddy Out

Over the past few weeks Alyce has been helping me with my project.  She has helped me hammer, dig, shovel rock, and put blocks into place for a retaining wall.  With all of that she has stayed pretty much out of the way while I've been working on things.  Her winning streak sadly has come to an end.  Alyce did something that cost time and money.

On Wednesday I took a half day off from work to get some blocks placed on my wall.  While out there Alyce was doing her own thing, staying out of trouble, and playing with a pink bat and ball on the patio.  As I was placing my ninth block and really started to hit a rhythm my concentration was broken with Alyce saying "oh no, my ball".  I asked her where her ball went and she pointed to a piece of black corrugated pipe which was attached to the main drain line that ran from the back of the house, under ground, and to the front of the house.  I was instantly sick to my stomach.  I pulled the lengths of pipe out, reached into the line and the ball was no where to be seen or felt.  At this point I was rather frustrated with my little girl, but I knew it wasn't her fault, and didn't direct any anger towards her.  I asked Mom to come out back and bring Alyce inside so that I could cool down a bit and figure out a way to get this ball out of the pipes.

To skip over a lot of details I was unsuccessful in getting out the ball and had to rely on a plumber a few days later to blast the line with water or use a camera to find the ball for $200.  Even the plumber was unsuccessful at getting out the ball.  I didn't know where the ball was, but I was pretty sure it wasn't in the drain.  While picking up some pipes today to get ready for a big day of work tomorrow I looked down into the pipe and staring back at me is the missing pink ball.

A lot of things could have happened.  Perhaps Alyce put the ball into this tube but pointed to the other tube when I asked her where her ball was.  Maybe I jumped to conclusions on what I thought happened and didn't bother to eliminate the possibilities.  I think both Alyce and I need to learn some lessons from this experience.  I should look before I leap.  I should learn to close open holes when children are around.  Alyce could learn to not play around daddy's projects but I think that might be asking too much from a 2 year old.  I regret that I had to spend $200 to learn these lessons, but if I don't learn anything from this experience then the money and time would be wasted.