Houston Flood 2017

Refrigerators float.

She hated that refrigerator. It hummed and groaned twice as loud as the old one, and it's door handle had to be taped down even though it was still brand new. The old one lasted 30 years and the door handle never slipped off.

Now, the hated one lays face down on the kitchen floor, humiliated. She feels its loss. Tells a story about a man who once saved his family by removing the refrigerator door, laying it on its back, and then loading his family inside to escape flood waters.

This one, though, never served such a heroic purpose. It, and its rotting contents, have been washed over with a slimy layer of sewerage silt, in a house who's brief submergence devastated everything.