Then, some bad luck. You encounter a big hard wall, a blockade if you will. "Oh well, " you say, "I'll just make a hard right and head south cause there's water there & I'm a root! I do what I want!". So you grow for a while. Then, one day, you get ripped from your water resource & die. Sad face emoticon.
Now.
Say you're a homeowner . . .
. . . and you're all "This toilet isn't flushing well! I'll plunge it because I'm self-reliant." You plunge a bit and nothing happens. A few days later, you're at a grocery store and pick up a legit plunger. The black rubber kind with a wood handle that could give you a splinter.
And not the flouncy one you bought at Target designed by some designer that conveniently fits in the cabinet under the sink.
Then, you're excited. You get home and you're all "Yay! A badass plunger! I feel like John McClane!" and you plunge your little heart out.
Fail. Toilet still no work. Sad face emoticon.
So for the next few months while your husband remains unemployed, you just don't go in that bathroom. You warn your unexpected visitors to only go Number 1 in the hall bathroom and if they need to go Number 2 they can use the master bath toilet. You hang your head in shame because you had to ask your neighbor about their toilet needs which forced them to announce it before the group paused in their conversation waiting for the response to the question at hand.
Then, excitement! Your husband gets a job! Yay! Paychecks are the best. They pay for things and make everything better.
Then, you find out your in-laws are coming to town and they'll stay at your place since you are finally an adult with a real guest bedroom with a real bed and everything.
Then, you call a plumber because you have money and because your in-laws are coming! Your in-laws are coming!
Your plumber comes over and says "What seems to be the trouble?" in a Hungarian accent because he's from Hungary. You tell him "This darn toilet won't flush. It's the weirdest thing." And he's all "Did you try a plunger?" and you reply "Oh yes, a real plunger too. Do you want to see it? I plunged my hardest. I even asked my mom to plunge and she's good at everything." No he doesn't want your plunger and he flushes the toilet and you both watch the slow-almost-mocking-you-at-this point-drainage, and he says "Huh." and you get a wee bit concerned because that's not something you want to hear from a plumber.
So, he goes to the van and gets the most badass plunger of them all. It puts your seemingly badass plunger to shame. No lie, you thought it was a Midieval torture device or maybe something more like Thor's thunder stick. Lightening stick? You excitedly ask "What's that?!?" thinking that this will be the end to all your problems and where can you get one? He's says "This is an auger." and makes his way towards the toilet. He places the crooky-do end in the toilet hole and then unscrews the swirly-bob so the snakey-part goes down into the pipe.
Like so:
Then he unscrews the swirly-do pulling the snakey-part back up into the bowl of the toilet.
And he doesn't pull up crayons either. He pulls up something else.
"Unbelievable." he says in his Hungarian accent. Feeling your concern level escalate about 23 notches in your belly, you lean over the toilet bowl and, without being able to make heads or tails of what you're looking at floating in the water, you timidly ask "What is it . . ." not really wanting to hear the answer.
"Roots." he says and then repeats the word of the day: "Unbelievable."
"This is bad." he says and then you ask "What does that mean?" and then he says "There might be roots in your pipes. A whole lot of roots."
And then a few images flash through your mind:
Mean trees with evil roots breaking into your pipes with taunting burglar masks on. Jack hammers breaking open the, up until this point, supportive and comforting concrete slab your house sits on. A team of men in futuristic jumpsuits (the kind those mean doctors wear at the end of ET) replacing your pipes. Then: dollar signs dollar signs dollar signs. Dollar. Signs.
"Well," he says, most likely noticing the barely there color draining from your face, "here's what I propose we do first. I take this toilet off and see if we can see any roots. Best thing would be if the roots were coming from around the pipes, up over the flange the toilet sits on, and growing down into the pipes. But if we can't see them . . . " and that's where you stop listening. He says something about a camera with a snake but you mainly just hear Hungarian blah blah blee blah's coming from his mouth. So, pulling it together, you say "Well. Let's do it. Take the toilet off."
So, you text your husband the happenings so far and tell him to literally pray that the roots are just coming up over the flange and have not broken into the pipes themselves. Then, you go to your bathroom and finish drying your hair and say the same recommended prayer.
After a few minutes, you go back into the dreaded bathroom. He's pulled the toilet up and is looking at the hole where the toilet was and says "Unbelievable." You, again, lean over to see what he's seeing and you have no idea what you're looking at.
Sensing your confusion, he says "Good news! The roots are not in the pipes. They're growing around the flange on the outside of the pipes - you see the flange is too short for this toilet, leaving a gap which gave them easy access." He's points at the flange and you have no idea what you're looking at. "See, your toilet might have leaked a little through this gap and the roots found it. So . . . I'm going to remove the roots, replace the flange with a higher, better one, and re-install the toilet." He speaks with affirmative hope in his voice and you finally feel a little relief. You're glad you said that prayer and you're even more glad that God heard you and answered it.
You text your husband the good news and go back to drying your hair.
A few minutes later you go back into the triage center and the plumber, without missing an opportunity, says "Unbelievable." You, again, lean over to see what he's looking at in the trash bag on the floor. And this time you know it when you see it.
Roots.
A whole pipe-shaped 18 incher in fact. Plus a bit of toilet paper.
Here's a diagram:
Your plumber says a few more "Unbelievable"s for good measure mostly because, as he tells you a few times, he's never seen anything like this before, and he goes on his merry way re-installing the toilet. He asks you to go buy some root killer and you happily oblige.
You come back home with said root killer in hand and he pours some of the magical copper sulfate crystals on the place where the roots used to be. Death to the roots. Die die die hard.
You sigh a content sigh and go to work a happy homeowner despite your level 3 concern over the impending invoice you'll receive for his services.
Life is good again, God is great, and, you think to yourself, roots might just be worse than worms. Happy face emoticon.
(If you're new here, you won't understand the worm reference. Click here and here and try not to feel too bad for me.)
