Last year in January, I came home one day in a pouring rainstorm to find that water was seeping into my residence through one of the ceiling light fixtures. We were able to deal with it temporarily by placing a bucket under the drip and hoping the problem wouldn’t get worse, but it was still a very unsettling thing to realize that the place you live in is not waterproof.

A month later, the problem got worse when another heavy rainstorm caused much more damage: water was leaking through the roof, through the walls, and pooling in the upstairs carpeting. I woke up on a Sunday morning in February to find a lake growing in the carpet. Fortunately, I have one of those Bissel carpet shampooers, which just happens to be a great tool for sucking water out of carpets, and it definitely earned its keep on that morning. I was glad I have that shampooer, because without it, I don’t know how I would have kept the rising flood from getting much worse than it did. As it was, there was still enough water to soak through the upstairs floor and into the downstairs.

The leaking roof meant that those early-2008 rains caused a lot of damage both inside and out, and for months afterward, contractors came to replace the roof (which hadn’t been replaced in 25 years, and I was told the roof was only designed for 15-20 years of life, so it was definitely time), repair the drywall, and paint. Now the place looks brand new, and the painted walls are a brighter, more inviting color – the downstairs had been a pale grey and is now what the painters call “sandy beach” (although my kids tease me that it looks pink), and it looks remarkably more welcoming than what had been there before – so all’s well that ends well, even though it was an inconvenience having all those workers around for such a long time.

A month or two after this was all over, another rainfall showed me that the roof repairs had blocked up the drainage off of the roof, causing the roof to flood. Now, you might be wondering how a roof can flood. Well, you see, my roof isn’t an ordinary roof; it’s actually a deck. The following pictures are a little old – in fact they’re from when I first moved here, because I already have these pictures and I’m too lazy to take new ones – but they’ll give you an idea of what the rooftop deck area looks like, more or less:

As you can see, the rooftop is enclosed on all sides by a short wall, which means that if there isn’t adequate drainage, potentially a flood up there could be a very bad thing. So, I had a plumber friend of my neighbor’s repair the drain. (Probably I shouldn’t have needed to, since the guys who did the original contracting job were at fault, but … well, trust me, this way was just easier for lots of reasons.)

I’m extremely glad I did, because it’s now February again, which is heavy-rainfall season in southern California. It’s been raining here for the past several days. A couple of days during that time I went up to look at the roof to make sure everything was okay, and it was, which was reassuring. On Friday – two days ago – the rainfall got especially heavy, but I didn’t think there was anything to be concerned about because I had checked on the roof occasionally to make sure all was well, so I knew I could relax.

Well, I thought I could relax … until water started leaking into the upstairs again. It wasn’t much, just some drips around a door frame, but still!

After all that repair work, I thought, this place still isn’t waterproof??

So I went up to the roof to see what was going on, and that’s when I discovered that the entire deck was six inches deep in cold, cold water. That’s when I really freaked out. In a panic, and in bare feet, I went out with a bucket and started to bail water over the sides – until I realized that there was so much water there that this approach would take all night.

That’s when I went over to the drain to see if I could see why it wasn’t working like I thought it should, only to find that the drain cover had been dislodged and a big pile of leaves was blocking the drain.

Thank god, I thought. I can fix this!

I pulled the leaves out of the drain – and there were a lot of them &ndash and replaced the drain cover, and thank goodness, the water started draining again. Not long afterward, the wading pool that had formed on my roof had subsided, and life was normal again. With the crisis over, I went inside to take a long, hot shower to revive my frozen hands and feet.

The next day, I told this story to my neighbor. He pointed out something I hadn’t thought of at all: with all that extra water weight on the roof, he says I’m lucky the roof didn’t collapse. Yikes!

I have now learned my lesson: I will never again procrastinate clearing the fallen leaves off of that deck area. A drain cover is a good thing to have up to a point, but it can’t do its job when it’s covered in a huge pile of leaves.

Now I know.