Adult male, fall from a ladder.” This time of year, the emergency scanner in the newsroom crackles with that message as often as not. It is do-it-yourself season and early-stage geezers like yours truly find it near to impossible not to take on tasks around the house and grounds better left to younger, more flexible people.
I, myself, was up on the roof a couple of weeks ago, cutting a huge pine limb that landed there during the February blizzard. As careful as I was, I avoided lacerating my left knee with a chain saw by a matter of millimeters. After that debacle, I leaned on one of the kids to get after the pine needles that had built up in the gutters. In our sixth decade and beyond, we no longer bounce when we hit the ground.
My first brush with age-related D.I.Y. damage actually took place about a decade ago, not long after I had faced reality and started using reading glasses. I had a pair of cheapies from CVS on my face as I came down a stepladder from atop the chicken coop and missed the last step. I wrenched an ankle, and it was weeks before I could get around without limping. Gravity’s a bitch, as I am increasingly figuring out.
Of late, I have been keeping my D.I.Y. to ground level. Recently, my endlessly patient sister suggested that I do something about the nonrunning 2000 Toyota Tundra I parked in her yard. Getting it going required no more elevation than an overturned milk crate so I could replace a head gasket. Working underneath the truck was another matter, probably also age-related.
Flat on my back messing with the fuel filter, a feeling like seasickness came over me. It was not the first time; during a yoga class in Amagansett some weeks prior, dizziness and a cold sweat during an extended downward dog pose forced me to sit out the rest of the session. I suppose this is something I should mention the next time I go see my doctor, along with my growing list of other complaints.