Posted in A Moment in My Life

“A Little Less Helpless”

A Moment in My Life – Tuesday, December 1, 2020

I came home feeling a bit frazzled with a lot to do and a little time to do it all in when I glanced at the microwave clock. It said 11:59, and my morning slipped away from me. I passed by and glanced up at the wall clock, and it said 11:35. I jumped for joy that I had more time than I initially thought. What? Wait a minute, why did I think it was 11:59? I went back to the kitchen and stared at the microwave clock before I glanced at my watch, which confirmed noon, not 11:35.

The wall clock never fails. I went to the closet and dragged out the step ladder. With the step ladder, I was able to just reach the clock. I lifted the clock and saw the C battery embedded in the back. It made sense that Mark always took care of changing the battery without my knowledge. Now, I inherited the task. I lifted the clock to remove it from the wall, and the nail and pin securing the clock to the wall went flying to the floor. My first thought was, ‘Oh great. Now I will have to hammer the nail back onto the wall.’

Later in the day, I went to Lowes for a C battery and popped it into the battery compartment, and the clock started up again. Phew! Glad that’s all it was. 

Next, I hauled the Megalite ladder from the garage and placed it below the clock, located above the entranceway from the living room to the back of the house. I did the usual thing to pull the two sides to an A-frame position, but it didn’t budge. I tried as I might but couldn’t get that ladder to open up for me. Eventually, I figured out I needed to remove the hooks from both sides, but it still did not move. I didn’t have time to deal with this ladder. Lite it might be, but user friendly, it was not. I will look up YouTube when I have time. Not today. I hauled that ladder back to the garage and grabbed the old faithful wooden ladder, and that baby did the trick. 

I am so grateful for my girlie purple toolkit that gets a lot of mileage these days. I fumbled inside for my hammer, and I went up the ladder to pound in the nail. It sure would be nice to have someone on the ground guiding me where to put that nail. I remember being that someone for Mark when he first did this. Very quickly, it was a moot point. I found the existing hole and decided to stick the nail and pin back where it came from, and if that didn’t work, I would hammer it in a new hole. It went in securely! No new hole punched today. Yay!

I got off the ladder, retrieved the clock, got back up on the ladder, and said a little prayer. I worried that the clock might drop when I fastened the hook from the clock’s back to the pin on the wall, fearing it might pull out the nail again. It worked! I aligned the clock with 12 North and 6 South. I waited to confirm the clock wouldn’t take a dive before returning the ladder to the garage.

A half-hour later, the clock read 11:55. What? It was 6:05 when I got off the ladder. I went back to the garage, grabbed the ladder, and gently adjusted the arms to reset the time, and waited before hauling the ladder back to the garage. This time, it was a success. After this endeavor, I feel a little less helpless.

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