When the repairman arrived, he took all of five minutes to find the cause of the problem. The nozzle that sprays a fine mist of fuel oil to be ignited was clogged by sludge. In our over 40 years in the house, we never encountered this problem before. He also said the nozzle was bent so my mother and I wondered if the problem was somehow connected to the cleaning job that was done two weeks ago.
As we made plans to host my brother and his family for Thanksgiving dinner, the furnace was not too far from the back of my mind. Then just two hours before company showed up, the heater died again. This time, it was much colder outside so putting off a repair was out of the question. The already expensive emergency service call would be even more so since it was a major holiday. I was a little mad at God for His “perfect” timing. When my brother and his family arrived, the house was cold and his children had to keep their jackets on.
The subcontracted repairman was busy with so many service calls, it took him quite a long time to get to us. When he checked the furnace, the filters were clogged with sludge. He also noticed the electrodes which sparked a fire had been worn down so I had them replaced too. Heat was eventually restored and we could finally enjoy Thanksgiving dinner in a warm house.
My mother and I were not happy with our fuel oil provider so a few days later, we demanded the owner drop by the house to give us some answers if he wanted to keep us as customers. When my mother questioned the owner about the quality of his company's cleaning job, he rolled his eyes. I then asked why the burned out electrodes on the furnace were missed. He apologized and offered to reimburse us. There was never a good explanation why so much sludge had clogged our furnace's filters and when we wondered why the nozzle had been bent, the guy placed blame on his fellow employees saying how difficult it was to find good help these days. We watched him test the fuel oil and there were no sediments this time around. The owner was cocky and dressed like a slob. It was a far cry from how things used to be.
For such a long time, this oil company was extremely professional. It's employees were all part of the same family and everyone wore spiffy uniforms. They worked hard to earn the trust and (dare I say) friendship of their customers by blending competence with friendliness. Their invoices featured the logo of a girl peacefully sleeping in her bed with the slogan: Safe, Dependable Oil Heat. When the previous owner's son took over, some of those little things that made this company a pleasure to deal with started to fall by the wayside. Maybe the company's new logo should be a picture of my niece shivering with her winter jacket on.
Often when life throws us a curve ball, our knee-jerk reaction is to blame God. I was guilty of that when our furnace stopped working on Thanksgiving. What we should do is look to see if our difficulties were caused by someone failing to give it their all. Cutting corners may bring a person an immediate short-term gain but it usually comes at the expense of someone else's long-term peace of mind.
