And Now - In The Center Ring...

I am afraid of heights. This is not a big problem in life, but occasionally it does cause trouble.

When we bought the Tower House, I was glad that it had a fairly new shingle roof. The house is tall, and the roof angles are steep, so it would be scary for me to work on. But I was comforted to think that the roof was probably good for the next fifteen years. Then two weeks ago we had that windstorm and some shingles blew off.

I tried to be a coward. Lee Ann called a roofer for me, so I wouldn't have to do the repair. She called four times. The last time, when she pressed him, the roofer admitted that we were at the bottom of a list two months long. So I had to do it.

The photo shows my little green extension ladder sitting on a stand I built which is attached to the front porch roof. The missing shingles were at the bottom front corner of the high roof - on my right hand side from the top of the ladder. The stand was necessary because the ladder had to sit on the sideslope of the porch roof, and to keep the feet firmly in place. I spent four hours building the stand, fastening it to the roof and positioning the ladder on it. I also roped the ladder bottom to a screw eye in the siding to keep it from sliding out, and strapped the ladder top in place to make sure it could not fall over sideways. Still, I was terrified to go up that ladder. The base seemed solid, but what if it gave way? Were ten screws enough to keep it from sliding down the porch roof once I was on the ladder? (Fixing all those screw holes is my next task.) What if the whole porch chose that moment to collapse? Or could a gust of wind cause me to lose my balance and plunge to the ground? I was only 20 feet up, but it felt like a hundred.

But it all went fine once I went up the ladder, and the actual repair took only a half hour. I avoided looking down from my somewhat awkward perch. Lee Ann was right there, handing my tools up and helpfully clutching my pantleg.