I was looking at the sun streaming through my porch windows on Friday. Filthy. They were filthy and the window frames looked rough. They needed cleaning and painting. So I got out my bucket of paint, the Windex, and the ladder. I stretched the ladder out to its full length and leaned it against the wall of the porch. It seemed so long when it was laying on the ground, but now against the house it was obviously not long enough. I ignored that and grabbed the Windex and a large wad of paper towels. As I climbed towards the top I noticed a warning on one of the rungs. Something about extending the ladder too far. I assumed that was not meant for me and kept climbing. For some reason I figured that I could reach the second story windows by standing on the top rung. I never got that far. As I neared the top fear set in and a childhood memory flashed through my mind. It was a memory of sitting in our kitchen on Ravinia Drive, eating lunch, and hearing my dad screaming as the ladder he was on made a rat-a-tat sound while sliding down the side of our house. We all ran outside to see Dad writhing in pain and cursing as I had never heard before.
I could feel the ladder bow and bend as my fat ass started back down. There would be no painting of the window frames. No washing of the windows with Windex and paper towels. You can't say I never learned anything from Dad. I learned how to curse really good.
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