Never a dull moment.
The other day I heard banging and it felt as though it was awfully close. At first I wondered whether someone had taken pity on our slightly age weary barns to give them a breath of fresh air, or more accurately, stop the air from free flowing down the hard earned gaps in the roof that seems to be copyrighted by old buildings. Or perhaps an aesthetics enthusiast had taken it upon himself to make our buildings blend into the neighbourhood.
Thankfully none of the above. Would have surprised me anyway as when we had taken the step to re-patch our outside walls with a nice coat of paint not one of our neighbours took the time to comment on it or even to say; ' well done, that looks jolly nice '.
So I looked out of our lounge window and only saw an arm with a hammer attached to it swing back and forth atop the lofty height of the roof next door. Wondering what was going on, I moved through to our kitchen to have a more detailed look and lo and behold, our neighbour was atop his roof refitting a skylight with dexterity and youthful moves. Gosh, I was amazed considering that he is almost eighty.
Respect mingled with worry. What if he lost his footing? Would I be there fast enough to help him or was his wife keeping watch by the ladder? Each day this week he has been fixing his skylight and I think that is amazing and inspiring. Many others his age have difficulty finding the fridge on their own while he is up on roofs, down on his haunches fixing the driveway or even simply mowing his big garden. Murphy's law that he has us as neighbours, the least D.I.Y'ers that one could find.
Each day that he was hammering atop his roof I happened to hang up the washing outside but of course I made doubly sure not to attract his attention or greet him lest he lost his footing...
Biggi
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