In the wee small hours of Friday night/Saturday morning we had a fire at our home. Already asleep, we were alerted to the fire by the fire detectors. My wife's presence of mind enabled her to grab our foam fire extinguisher and put out the fire while I got the kids out of their bedrooms to safety. As luck would have it, we got away lightly, with the only major damage being to to hot water and heating system. There is soot all over the upstairs floor of our house, smoke in the walls and carpets, and some flooding in the living room below, but compared to what might have been without smoke detectors doesn't bear too much thinking about.
So now we await the clean-up and repairs. The loss adjuster from the insurance company has been very helpful and reassuring. Currently we are getting quotes to pass on to the insurance company for approval. Having never had to deal with an incident like this before has made it all the more traumatic, and in a sense a leap into the unknown. Rationally, the worst of it for the time being is being unable to have a hot bath or shower, but who faces these things rationally? In our house there has been a return to the 1950s, with kettles of water being boiled for hair washes. A cold shower is unpleasant and not something to be undertaken lightly, if at all. Even James Bond only runs the water cold for the last 30 seconds of a normal shower.
The timing of the fire was not optimal, if such a thing was even possible. But to be without hot water in Summer is better than in Winter. However, my son's bar mitzvah is on the horizon, together with all of the final arrangements which need to be made to ensure a memorable occasion for him. As such we are juggling too many demands on our time. And this in the knowledge that it will be several weeks before we can even think about a return to a normal life. We have guests coming in from overseas for this occasion, as well as a home-based reception. This fire will make the bar mitzvah memorable, but not for the best of reasons. The need to deal with builders, plumbers and the quotes and estimates, means that I will probably be unable to get to the airport and collect my guests next week. I will have to call on the services of taxis (Darren: are you reading this?) to ferry people from Heathrow.
As if that was not enough there is also the need to work and earn a living, and do the "school run" twice each day. There is an American saying that "when life throws you lemons, make lemonade", but everyone knows you need more than lemons to do so. We have been thrown an overload of lemons, but without water and sugar all we can do is drown under them, experiencing their sour, bitter taste. I am sure that in the fullness of time I will look back on this experience with a wry smile, but for now all I can manage is a somewhat-forced sense of perspective: at least no-one was hurt. It could have been so very much worse.
As someone who spends his professional hours lecturing on the risk-return tradeoff (in financial and economic contexts), and thinking about financial risk management I have naturally tended to apply my knowledge to this incident. Consequently I cannot speak highly enough of the importance of smoke detectors and foam fire extinguishers for managing personal risk at home. My family and I owe our lives to these appliances.
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