Our Old Washer

Our old washer sits in the basement.  I can't remember when we got it but I know when it finally stopped working.  It was 2021.  It was relatively new.  We had to replace our old one and it wasn't that old because the people in the four family unit we lived in for a year was using our washer and dryer and another person's appliances during that time. The old man who got our apartment stripped the handle on it.  

The kids that were on drugs were using it in the middle of the night.  We wondered during Covid about how their laundry was getting done.  My mom started having trouble with it in the summer of 2020 and she had called for me to come downstairs.  I came down in the basement to see what was wrong.  She did it so the kids in the apartment would hear us talking about the washer being broken.  She was having trouble with it getting started but she wanted them to hear it so maybe they would stop using it.

Guess what happened an hour later?  The guy who lived in that apartment loaded up his car with four loads of laundry. I couldn't believe it.  We couldn't believe it.  They were using our appliances.  We never saw them leave with laundry so we wondered what they were doing.  Now we knew.

By winter after they left, the washer was on its last legs.  My mom knew someone who could take a look at it and he tried.  He was a repair person from Sears.  He spent about 2 days working on it and I gave him 300 dollars for working on it.  He did put in the work but there was nothing that could be done.

We got a new washer and we offered the old one to the monster and his girlfriend.  They were happy to take it and the monster was going to see if he knew someone who could work on it.  After he screamed that we were "c" words, my mom had approached him and said if you're not going to fix that washer, we want it back.   The washer sat there for the next year untouched and they got appliances put in for themselves.  They used ours if they felt like it.  We found that out later.  He never apologized for his outburst but he wanted that washer.

After he banged on my ceiling, my mom went downstairs and pushed the washer over by our stuff.  He never said a word.

This is the stuff that makes me cry.  I put $300 into the washer after someone abused it and loaded it up with their laundry. I don't have $300.  That year they gave us a bonus to buy our own office supplies like a chair or a desk.  I could have paid some of my medical with that money instead of trying to fix an appliance and spare my mom from using a credit card.  After we gave up on it, we offered it to a couple who we thought were nice and starting out.  Turns out, they used our appliances in the middle of the night as well.

This is why I break down and sob.  I try and I never seem to get anywhere.