Sometimes You Have to Accept You Have Limitations
Yesterday I found myself in a quandary. Despite the certainty of some people, I am actually an independent person. At the moment, I am back in school, riding two horses, starting a business, hopefully, a successful one, and have the passion and drive of a 30-year-old, or at times a 12-year-old. So, when my electric shutters broke in my bedroom for the second time in two weeks, I was determined to fix them myself. Last week, I watched as a friend fixed them and it didn’t look that difficult. Okay, it looked difficult, but nothing I couldn’t do. Despite the fact that when he fixed them, there were two of us, being single and living on my own, I don’t have the luxury of a second pair of hands on demand. Something that I didn’t quite think through when I ventured into the world of electric shutters!
I remembered that we had to slowly manoeuvre the blind into the right place, a little up, a little down, me pushing the buttons and he standing on the chair telling me how far up or down to go. I have long arms, what’s the big deal, I can reach from one end to the other. I know that even on the best of days I mix up which one is up and which one is down, so I made sure to do a little check before I embarked on my DIY project du jour. I gave myself 30 minutes to get the blind back on the track and had my day planned with lovely things. Go to the nursery, buy a new tree fern for the one that I’ve recently murdered in my back garden, then ride my horses in the sunshine, well one in the sunshine, the other in the arena, she’s not ready for outdoor travel yet! Then back to go for a swim in the pool and relax in the sun before making a light dinner and having an early night.
I took the box off that contains the mechanism, no problem. I climbed up on the chair and had a good look inside. Yes, the bloody shutter has come off the track again and there’s one piece that needs to be put back on. Okay, the 30-minute job might be a bit longer, but maybe there’s a way I can just get it wrapped a little for the time being so I’m not in the dark. Funny, I used to love living in my cave before, but recently I have found myself drawn more and more to the brightness of the house than usual. I think it’s love or lust, another time for that story. It’s a doozy. Of course, it is, my life is full steam or nothing at all.
Next step, turn the roller slightly forward to try and catch the shutter around the roller and bring it up a bit. No problem…but for the fact that I had a ring on my finger when I had my hand wrapped firmly around the roller whilst grabbing the shutter to pull it around. Without hesitation, that ring got caught in the blind and suddenly my arm was getting pulled up into the cavity where the shutters are! Screaming at the top of my lungs with nobody here to hear was useless but I suppose it was instinct. Definitely instinct. Maybe my neighbours would hear me, maybe my new friend would hear me 200 kilometres away. Somebody, anybody. Shit, I am sure that I’m going to lose my hand here…my arm is now almost up to my elbow in the damned casing and there’s no earthly way I can reach the up/down buttons on the side of the wall now! My feet barely dangling on the chair below me as my arm goes higher and higher and the pain is more excruciating.
Somehow I managed to get the ring off my finger and then the shutter finished its cycle and I got my arm out of the casing. Staring at three very squashed fingers with big knuckles I was still screaming at a fair pitch, but now off the chair, I was able to jump around the room because, of course, that was going to stop the pain. Quickly I ran into the en-suite and ran my hand under cold water. That hurt even more but I knew I had to do it. Then after I finally stopped hyperventilating and shaking, I went downstairs, got all the icepacks I had and wrapped my hand. I went out into the back garden in the Sun, sat there in complete shock that I could have lost my hand and am lucky that it’s likely only a couple of broken fingers and iced it for a couple of hours before going to ride.
The pain of holding the reins was equally as bad as when my hand was stuck inside the casing, so my riding was limited to a quick ride around outdoors, wincing at every pull of the rein, thinking that I can just make it a few more minutes until I go to the hospital for x-rays and get home and take something for the pain, more ice, more ice, more ice.
What bothers me more? The fact that I can’t do something on my own anymore or that I’m stupid enough to try and do something on my own when I know I need help.
The art of asking for help is just something I haven’t mastered yet. At this age, I think it’s unlikely that it will be something I ever master. With life comes pain….that’s the moral of today’s story. Physical pain is much easier to tolerate than emotional pain. So, as much as I was writhing in pain yesterday and today with the pain of two broken fingers, it is nothing compared to the emotional pain I suffer at the loss of love.
The moral of the story is, don’t stick your hand in an electric shutter casing when you have no clue and don’t accept a man’s help if they’re only willing to go half the distance. It’s all or nothing in my book.
Cheers
B x
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