Finding Peace in Blown Insulation

I spent ten plus years crawling around the cramped innards of an HH-60 Pavehawk helicopter without complaint (a few expletives maybe). I have slithered into the darkest, smallest spaces in a C-130, and emerged relatively intact. I have been surrounded by thousands of despicable looking crickets clinging to the dank walls of a crawlspace, and kept my cool. But yesterday, while wriggling on my belly in the attic through two feet of blown insulation, I encountered the edge of my sanity, and fell off.

If the pitch of one's roof is exceptionally low, reason would dictate that one choose not to attempt the virtually impossible task of sifting through a mountain of puffy, itchy insulation to find a wire of the same color as the insulation in which it is buried. Certainly, a normal human should not attempt to cram themselves into the sort of angular space that one would find at the edge of one's roof near the overhang. I really thought doing this would be a good idea.

Where I found the energy to do any of this I will never know. I am bruised the full length of my body, yet, despite dreading another trip to the furthest recesses of the attic, I feel the urge to repeat this insanity. I have to because my family is counting on me. Who can deny a family there due? If they desire to be able to illuminate the out of doors with the flick of a switch, who am I to deny them such a seemingly trivial wish?

I don the proper apparel, tools and a prayer, and head up to the nether regions of home. I give myself a safety briefing to the effect of:

"Should we be doing this?"

"Probably not."

"Don't fall off the ladder."

"Okay, what else."

"Uh, make sure the power is turned off."

"Got it. Anything else."

"Not really. Don't think about the huge, very pregnant spider that you watched dangle from the eave of the roof yesterday."

"Great! Thanks for bringing that up."

"No problem. Let's get 'er done."

"I hate that slogan."

"Tough. Get to work."

"You stink as a safety officer."

Sound of toe scuffing rocks as I sulk and walk away to do my job.

My only solace is the knowledge that my dandelion patch will be waiting if I need to visit.

S'mores and My Higher Power

If, as Forrest Gump so eloquently pointed out,"Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you are going to get.", then it must also be like a stack of s'mores because you never know how balanced it will be until it starts to melt.

Yes, this analogy is a bit flimsy on paper, but try it. Stack your chocolate, the marsh mellow and the graham cracker, heat it and watch what happens. Frantic, haphazard stacking will produce an unbalanced s'more that collapses on its way to your mouth. The chocolate slithers off of your graham cracker onto you shirt, and the marsh mellow collides with the skin of you chin instead of your lips. It's tragic, and avoidable. If one takes a moment to contemplate their stack, they will recognize imbalances in cracker, chocolate and marsh mellow, make adjustments as necessary, and commence to microwave their creation. This stack will maintain its balance from plate to mouth. Oh, yes, indeed the goodness of chocolaty marsh mellow will most assuredly ooze from between its graham cracker sandwich, but you will expect it and be ready to intercept and ingest the sweet goodness on your terms.

I warned everyone to expect absurdity, and I have delivered. Life is a box of chocolate and a stack of s'mores and so very much more. Even if we choose the chocolate with awful maple filling, or end up with chocolaty ooze on our new blouse, we have the God given faculties to accept our plight and press forward. It was the lure of chocolate that drew our attention to that box, and just because a teensy bit of maple goo appeared, we still managed to savor a bit of chocolate. And for all the mess from our hastily stacked s'more, we felt the sweetness of it on our tongue. All we need to do next is pick up the mess and be grateful for the experience. So simple and yet so difficult.

My beloved has caught me in the act, and I am being not so subtly herded back out of doors to finish hanging trim. I am grateful for the love, grateful for the sense of urgency, and grateful for the opportunity to be of service to my family. Whatever the consequences of my selections may be, I am grateful for those as well.