My thought process here recorded occurred on a stormy day not long ago. Holding my head down against the driving sheets of rain on my way to my woodshop across the driveway, I heard a splashing sound which I felt necessitated some investigation. I looked up and saw one of my gutters was spilling over.
Okay, it’s blocked; that’s simple enough.
What made it less simple was A.) It was two stories up, and B.) I’m near seventy years old.
Question! Should I or shouldn’t I fix my own gutter? Lord knows I’ve done it more than a few times over the years; but not now, not during a storm.
I spoke with my Sabrina about what I had discovered, and my intentions of remedying the situation. She, somewhat tersely: You’ve got no business up there; ‘at your age’ was the rest of her comment, unspoken but unmistakable.
I reflected on it a bit and decided, Sabrina is advising me the way I should be advising myself [be cautious]. And she’s right: Two stories up, in a 70 year old chassis is no time for an ‘oops’ moment.
As with some other physical chores, I feel like I can safely perform them [after all, I have done them in the past] but this is, I fear, a kindly, well-intentioned self-deception. My brain says I can; my wisdom says I shouldn’t. To judge present ability on past accomplishments is fraudulently, but lovingly bought forward to my mind as still being within my capabilities; more a matter of pride and memory than it is of intelligence.
Merely because I imagine a thing to be true, is poor provenance for it being so.
Maybe I shouldn’t fret so about growing older. Growing older also means I’m living longer – or might, if I refrain from ladders, two-story climbs, and leaking gutters.
Lucky Garvin