Blessing in Disguise

I’ve heard before — “bad things happen so good things can come out of it.”

Honestly, I usually roll my eyes at this slogan. It makes me think of a reality dating show where people break up and adopt this phrase as their mantra. But I have to admit, a small situation had me thinking of this “cheesy” phrase.

Last week, our dishwasher broke. No matter how many times you pressed the “start” button, this thing was not going to run, and my husband claimed to smell a burning scent.

“That’s just great,” I thought. Then came the obvious questions — Can the dishwasher be fixed? Will we have to get a new one? And the kicker — How much is this going to cost?

We had an appliance electricion come to our house the next day, and it turns out, the broken dishwasher was a blessing in disguise. It wasn’t working because a wire had fried, and the electrician was able to fix it impressively fast. But he also discovered a much bigger problem. It turns out, there was a steady drip of water leaking underneath our dishwasher. And when I saw the damage, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

The wood flooring we couldn’t normally see was discolored and already becoming uneven. It wasn’t rotten, but it was definitely headed in that direction. Who knows how long that leak had been there?

The electrician said we were lucky to catch the problem now, since it wouldn’t be long before we’d see the effects on our basement ceiling. He also said the previous owners of our house probably new about this problem, since someone had attempted a hacky DIY repair.

If the dishwasher hadn’t broken down, we probably wouldn’t have discovered that leak until it became a much larger (and costly) problem. Despite myself, I said the Pinterestworthy quote out loud. “Bad things happen so good things can come out of it.”

I mean, it wasn’t a break up or a health scare, but the situation still had me feeling grateful. Cheers to your problems becoming blessings. ❚

Lindsey Lukas Senior Editor