WHAT DO AMERICAN FAUCETS DO I FORGET

You'd think the kitchen and bathroom faucets in our house would be more alike in their details, in view of the fact that Germany and Japan were allies during WWII.

Also on the plus side are the facts that both countries use the metric system and their faucets swivel left for HOT and right for COLD; but beyond that level of international cooperation is where the trouble begins, because when it comes to the real basic of OFF and ON, Japan and Germany are on opposite sides of the world. The J faucet (bathroom) goes down for ON and up for OFF, whereas the G faucet (kitchen) categorically rejects such unregimented folly. What do American faucets do I forget... Such culturomental gaps are common in serial expats who, in designing their own houses, can fall prey to mere design.

Also, when it comes time to replace a part on our metric G faucet you'd think it could be found in this hemisphere. If one were lacking certain scruples that hinder success in business, one could come up with a number reasons why a J/G faucet maker would find some respective way to undercome global metric and L-R system standardization so as to make their own devices most appealing to their countrymen (i.e., you have no choice), and the products of their former allies' devices less appealing (i.e., OFF is ON, and vice-versa).

On the other hand, however, whether left or right, surely the J faucets that get shipped to G don't do like they do in J, so why should the G faucets in J be totally G, when everyone here - except A's like me - goes J ON and J OFF? Is anyone minding the worldstore?

One positive aspect of all this is that if you have a J faucet in your J bathroom and a G faucet in your J kitchen, you always have to remember where you are when you want some water to flow, which keeps you alert and firmly in the now of both time and place unless you want to get drenched as you stand there. So it is that I never go into the bathroom and turn the water OFF, and always vice-versa in the kitchen, which is the way international relations should be in any case but of course they aren't, are they, just look at the faucetry for one thing, and all those international plumbers making a big mess of the world flow for all to see. They should spend some time in my kitchen and then use my bathroom, or vice-versa.

ON THE RARITY OF FAUCET HANDLES

This afternoon, after spending the morning trying to buy just the handle for the faucet that controls the water line to our house because the water cooperative upgraded the system recently and suddenly our water pressure was too high, came out of the faucet like a fire hose, which can be disconcerting at 5 am when you’re just bending over in quotidian innocence to freshen your face and you’re met by Niagara Falls so I went out this morning to the little stone grotto and uncovered the faucet to turn it down and the ancient thing just crumbled in my hand like this was subterranean Rome or something so there I was out in a morning that had been rich in other plans trying to find a faucet handle store and being guided from mystified shops to ever smaller, nonplussed shops, at last to a tucked-away plumbing supply house I’d driven by a thousand times but never noticed because I’d always been rich in faucet handles, and there I showed the guy in the parking lot the tissue-wrapped powdery relic and asked if he had any faucet handles this size, at which he raised an eyebrow or two, then did that Japanese tooth-hissing sound that means anything from we’re out of beer to you have a week to live, it’s a dreaded sound in every instance and this was one, at last he said that they don’t sell handles separately from the faucet unit itself and the yen signs began to climb in my head because no way was I myself going to replace the entire underground faucet mechanism I'd have to hire a plumber, which anyway was insane when all I needed was a handle but we now live in a world we have never lived in before, ruled to a new extent by plumbers, and in the way of things it appeared there was no way out, faucetwise, plus the fact of that ominous hiss, followed by a pause, and he began walking meditatively toward the warehouse, I following, sad relic in hand, where from a big binful of entire faucets he took out a tauntingly brand new faucet, odd how faucets can suddenly taunt, it had a bright red, uncomfortably appealing handle on it of exactly the size and type I needed but did not even remotely wish to use in toto, and he said well I’ll just sell you the handle then. We went out to his truck and he got a tool to remove the luscious ruby handle, I confirmed the size, still in disbelief and asked how much, when he did the hiss again, a quick one, said we never sell this separately, so I don’t know… 200 yen I guess (2 dollars). Bless him and all his family for as long as there are faucets.

Oh yeah, about the afternoon... I’ll get to that maybe tomorrow after I wash my face in tranquility.