Little House in the Big Desert

So it seems that The Pistol, 6, seems to be one of those people who just happens to be susceptible to boils. He had one in an unmentionable location several years ago while still in diapers. Then a couple of months ago, a very large one rose up above his left knee. Volcano-like, the surrounding skin was swollen, angry red, and painful, rising high to meet the core. It was a painful progression and when it burst, a gaping hole nearly as big around as a pencil where the core had been … seemingly as deep as the Grand Canyon. Now weeks later, after the scab has healed, there is still serious discoloration for about an inch all the way around, where the skin was infected, which is only slowly fading.

So imagine my distress when, while this disaster was still healing, I looked closer one day at his eye and asked him if he had banged into something, because there was swelling and redness radiating out from a point in the middle of his eyebrow. He had not hit it, but when I convinced him to let me touch it, it was immediately obvious that it was something much bigger than a pimple forming under the skin. I do know that boils (or anything) around the eye can be very serious; I read about orbital cellulitis which was rather frightening.

It was too late for anything but the emergency room at this point, and that seemed a bit drastic for a beginning boil. However, near the end of the first boil ordeal, I had discovered two homeopathic remedies for boils, which were no use for that one since it was so near to bursting already. So I decided to start with the homeopathics, alternating belladonna with arsenicum, every one every 30 minutes. And the next morning, peering closely at his eyebrow, there seemed to be less redness and swelling on the lid. I kept giving the belladonna and arsenicum, and kept it smeared with Black ointment, which I also discovered too late for any good with the previous boil. The swelling kept going down. I watched it very closely and at any sign of it getting bigger or worse even slightly, we would have headed to the doctor.

However, and blessedly, it reduced and reduced until it was barely pimple-sized. Then I turned my mind to wondering why he would get two boils so quick together and I think I came up with a somewhat plausible explanation. Until recently, he would crawl into the shower with me or his dad several times a week, but sometime back he began disdaining that. Too much clean, I suppose. The lack of showers, plus lots of outdoor play in what has turned out to be the worst allergy season ever on record, which I think may have lowered his immune system, it most likely the culprit.

So baths or showers every other day at a minimum, and so far, thank the good Lord, no further boils have reared their ugly heads.

We figure the total the burglar made off with is somewhere around $1500-$1700 worth of goods. As we have a $1000 deductible on our homeowner’s insurance, we figured we we just take the loss. Then Lenny called.

Lenny is our wonderful handyman, who, when I called him at 5:45 on a Thursday evening, when he was surely headed home in heavy traffic from a long day of physical labor, and told him what had happened with our back door, didn’t even hesitate or wait for me to ask, but said, "I’ll be right over." He secured the door to the door jamb with five enormous screws, which no crowbar could dislodge. The next day, he sent over a door specialist to have a look at our door.

It’s not a typical back door. For one thing, it has an enormous, not-quite floor to doortop single sheet of glass (double-paned and hard to break, thank goodness). For another, the doorjamb is double-wide, and the door shares the frame with a twin that looks like another door, but is in fact just a window, as it does not open.

Unfortunately, it ALL has to be replaced, door jamb, door, and decorative door-like window.

Unfortunately, it won’t be cheap.

Unfortunately, the cost of replacing the door is almost two and a half times as much as the cost of the goods we lost!

Now that we are looking at nearly $4000 to fix the door (demo, new parts, paint, cart off debris), we are calling Chubb. Fortunately they have (so far) lived up to their excellent reputation and not giving us any hassle about the claim. So far. We’ll see once everything has been submitted.