In a last ditch, primal effort to preserve life, I blindly plunged an outstretched hammer into anything that would save me from an untimely demise. With my eyes closed, preparing to embrace the impact of the ground, my hammer caught hold of the rooftop. Cheers and gasps cut through the howling winds as I kept my eyes shut tightly. I looked up at my outstretched hand that squeezed the rubberized body of my hammer and the twin shaved marks on the roof that the claw portion of my hammer dug into the plywood as I screeched to a halt. I choked and strained to keep all of my weight as centered as possible, failing to fully realize how close I was to certain pain and injury. Panic still flooded my mind and the adrenaline kept my hands trembling, but I was spared the brunt impact of the muddy ground below and was left dangling in the cold Midwestern air.
As my classmates rushed into the second story room to help me into the house, I was greeted with faces of amazement. They cheered my attempt at the nail and were astounded by my ability to react so quickly to utilize the tool at my disposal. Had I been ill positioned to make such a daring strike, I doubt I would be able to transcribe this story for you today. As I caught my breath, one classmate thrust the bent and rusty nail into my hand, the same one that had fallen to the muddy earth, which I gazed at for a long time. I guess I didn’t realize it then, but that little nail would resurface in my life at times of great fear. It served as a talisman of sorts with which I could remember the efforts of previous bouts of courage as a way of urging me forward through times of trial.
It is the reason I have less fear today, as I type this story at ten thousand feet in the air, from the relative discomfort of my first airline trip. Years ago I feared flying in planes for the same reasons I feared the tops of ladders, but today I find myself able to face the very thing that has restricted my migration to the far reaches of our planet. I no longer skirt from that which fills my mind with discomfort, but rather push forward through my mental trials, equipped with a heart set for adventure, confident in my own abilities regardless of the bleak situations within which I place myself from time to time. At all moments of my day, however, I find security in the little rusty nail that pokes my thigh from inside of my pocket as I face the challenges of each day without fear.
March, 2011
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Pulling A Nail Part II
I had no desire to be where I was, but once on the roof I had no chance of turning back. With the eyes of my peers glued to my every move, I recognized the limits of my own free will and my inability to back down from the task at hand. Sure, I could have told my coach there was no way I was going up that ladder, but the pressures of high school masculinity dictated otherwise.
Fighting the temptation to scream for help and cling to the ladder until the fire department rescued me like a kitten, I pressed my toes against the slippery top rung and stretched my hammer as far as I could. With my hips thrust against the metal rung, I begged for a quick death in the event I fall, which was growing more and more likely as my self confidence shrunk to that of a paraplegic tandem entered in a potato sack race. As my classmates urged me on through the whistling winds, I finally secured a hold on the nail with the back portion of my hammer. I wiggled and strained for it to loosen, but to no avail. It could have been cemented in for all I knew because the cylindrical piece of metal refused to budge. I struggled to regain a tactical approach to remove the nail, but the cold weather forced a chill into my bones that shook the very ladder I stood on.
With my hammer briefly secured on the nail, I was well past the point of no return. I had one chance left to pull the nail before the group would retreat back to the warmth of the building and the spectacle would be lost, as would my fame. With all of my might, I half reached, half jumped, to improve the angle of the hammer so that I might generate enough leverage to pull the little bugger out. In one downward swipe, my feet reconnected with the slippery rung as my arm simultaneously torqued the nail from the roof. The hammer flew behind me over my head, still in my grasp, but the rusty nail fell to the ground. My body recoiled from the abrupt landing on such a narrow surface and I lost my footing. With all my weight moving backwards, I failed to regain my initial hold on the top of the ladder. Hammer in hand, I clawed and squeezed to regain a hold with my left, but my efforts were futile. As the silver rungs of the ladder flew past my face, images of my family crying at my funeral flooded my mind. I saw memories of my childhood flicker in and out of my eyes as gravity had its way with me.
To be continued...
Fighting the temptation to scream for help and cling to the ladder until the fire department rescued me like a kitten, I pressed my toes against the slippery top rung and stretched my hammer as far as I could. With my hips thrust against the metal rung, I begged for a quick death in the event I fall, which was growing more and more likely as my self confidence shrunk to that of a paraplegic tandem entered in a potato sack race. As my classmates urged me on through the whistling winds, I finally secured a hold on the nail with the back portion of my hammer. I wiggled and strained for it to loosen, but to no avail. It could have been cemented in for all I knew because the cylindrical piece of metal refused to budge. I struggled to regain a tactical approach to remove the nail, but the cold weather forced a chill into my bones that shook the very ladder I stood on.
With my hammer briefly secured on the nail, I was well past the point of no return. I had one chance left to pull the nail before the group would retreat back to the warmth of the building and the spectacle would be lost, as would my fame. With all of my might, I half reached, half jumped, to improve the angle of the hammer so that I might generate enough leverage to pull the little bugger out. In one downward swipe, my feet reconnected with the slippery rung as my arm simultaneously torqued the nail from the roof. The hammer flew behind me over my head, still in my grasp, but the rusty nail fell to the ground. My body recoiled from the abrupt landing on such a narrow surface and I lost my footing. With all my weight moving backwards, I failed to regain my initial hold on the top of the ladder. Hammer in hand, I clawed and squeezed to regain a hold with my left, but my efforts were futile. As the silver rungs of the ladder flew past my face, images of my family crying at my funeral flooded my mind. I saw memories of my childhood flicker in and out of my eyes as gravity had its way with me.
To be continued...
Pulling A Nail
For as long as I can remember I have had a terrible fear of heights. It seems a complimentary phobia given my short stature, but for whatever cosmic reason I have always avoided separating myself too far from the ground. On a bleak afternoon in February, I forced myself to the very top of a fifteen foot ladder and faced the one thing that I fear most. I knew at that moment that my life will be forever changed by the action I was about to undertake.
It was my senior year of high school in suburban Chicago. I was enjoying a year filled with athletic achievement and scholastic recognition, not to mention a cream-puff schedule. One of the classes I was enrolled in, Building Trades, was a unique, two-hour, experienced based program that drew students from two local high schools together to learn the entire process of building a home. The course, taught by my wrestling coach and close mentor, involved the complete construction of a single family home from the pouring of the foundation to the application of hard wood floors and trim. At this point in the course, our classes had completed framing the first two floors and the roof was almost finished. This brings me back to the driving sleet of a Chicago February and my unlikely placement at the top of a shaky ladder.
This particular day involved several menial tasks, such as building a set of stairs for the basement and pulling arbitrary nails from various places on the home’s exterior. As the daily tasks were assigned to each student, my coach skipped over my assignment and asked me to meet him in the garage. It was there that he told me, in an almost hushed tone, that it was up to me to finish off the final roofing task; I was to prepare the plywood roof for the professionals who were hired to apply the shingles and for some reason I was the only man capable of such a task. He instructed me to the top partition of the family room roof, where I would find a single, rusty nail that was foolishly driven into the wrong plank. It was imperative, he told me, that I exercise caution as I climb because the conditions outside were quite unforgiving.
Unaware of how much this task would test my will, I marched the metal ladder to the second floor and began my ascent without much thought to the process. I was too eager to please my mentor to reflect on my own reluctance to climb tall ladders. It was considered an honor to be chosen to complete the most difficult task of the day and I was preoccupied with the praise I would receive from my classmates if I were to complete the difficult task successfully. Once high above the ground, with the freezing rain pricking my face in a comical consistency, my great fear of heights clouded my ability to rationalize the task at hand. The nail was an arms-length from the top rung of the ladder and my outstretched hammer failed to meet the required distance for a successful removal.
I found myself higher in the air than I have ever wished to be, forced to navigate a slippery rooftop with a growing audience below. Word got around the building that I was at the top of the treacherous roof and before I could look down a second time, all fourteen members of the class had dropped what they were doing so they could watch the crazy boy on the ladder.
To be continued...
It was my senior year of high school in suburban Chicago. I was enjoying a year filled with athletic achievement and scholastic recognition, not to mention a cream-puff schedule. One of the classes I was enrolled in, Building Trades, was a unique, two-hour, experienced based program that drew students from two local high schools together to learn the entire process of building a home. The course, taught by my wrestling coach and close mentor, involved the complete construction of a single family home from the pouring of the foundation to the application of hard wood floors and trim. At this point in the course, our classes had completed framing the first two floors and the roof was almost finished. This brings me back to the driving sleet of a Chicago February and my unlikely placement at the top of a shaky ladder.
This particular day involved several menial tasks, such as building a set of stairs for the basement and pulling arbitrary nails from various places on the home’s exterior. As the daily tasks were assigned to each student, my coach skipped over my assignment and asked me to meet him in the garage. It was there that he told me, in an almost hushed tone, that it was up to me to finish off the final roofing task; I was to prepare the plywood roof for the professionals who were hired to apply the shingles and for some reason I was the only man capable of such a task. He instructed me to the top partition of the family room roof, where I would find a single, rusty nail that was foolishly driven into the wrong plank. It was imperative, he told me, that I exercise caution as I climb because the conditions outside were quite unforgiving.
Unaware of how much this task would test my will, I marched the metal ladder to the second floor and began my ascent without much thought to the process. I was too eager to please my mentor to reflect on my own reluctance to climb tall ladders. It was considered an honor to be chosen to complete the most difficult task of the day and I was preoccupied with the praise I would receive from my classmates if I were to complete the difficult task successfully. Once high above the ground, with the freezing rain pricking my face in a comical consistency, my great fear of heights clouded my ability to rationalize the task at hand. The nail was an arms-length from the top rung of the ladder and my outstretched hammer failed to meet the required distance for a successful removal.
I found myself higher in the air than I have ever wished to be, forced to navigate a slippery rooftop with a growing audience below. Word got around the building that I was at the top of the treacherous roof and before I could look down a second time, all fourteen members of the class had dropped what they were doing so they could watch the crazy boy on the ladder.
To be continued...
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