I procrastinated and failed to get our 5th wheel camper winterized. I was worried that the cold weather we surprisingly had over recent weeks might have caused some damage. Then, the good Lord sent us several days of 50-degree-plus temperatures! Woo Hoo!
So, Tuesday morning I pulled the camper from New Middletown to Heron Woods where we could work on it with electric. My good brother-in-law, Charlie came over to walk me through the process for the second year. Troy also showed up as my faithful back-up! In short order, we had the lines flowing with antifreeze! What a great feeling!
Debbie wanted to pack some items for our mid-winter trip to Florida, so I let it sit overnight. After loading lawn chairs, blankets and a few sundry items, I pulled it back to the storage facility. It was late afternoon and due to a stop at Ace Hardware, I was losing sunlight as I arrived. The wind was gusting significantly!
I must have backed it up and pulled it forward over twenty times trying to get it exactly where it is supposed to be! In-and-out of the truck repeatedly to check distances and line-up! It goes much faster when I have someone to help! Finally, I got it where I wanted it. Then came the unhitching and securing everything before I could leave.
When I pulled the truck up to the gate and entered my code - nothing happened! I entered it repeatedly - with no results. What in the world? The mechanism didn't seem to be working...what could be wrong. Now it's dark and the wind is atrocious!
As I sat at the closed gate with my headlamps on, another truck pulled up from the outside. We each got out and walked to the gate. I told him that I couldn't get the gate to open. He smiled and said, "I know. And you're not going to get it to work for a good while!"
"Why?" I asked. He then reported that the Salem electric (which powers this stretch of Calla Road) was out! I felt like a prisoner! He asked where I lived. I told him Enon Valley. He told me that if I could climb the fence, he'd be glad to take me home. I thanked him and told him that I'd call my wife. Turns out he was a brother to one of my former parishoners from Free Methodist Community Church in New Middletown! :-)
I called Deb and she told me she'd leave right away. I parked the truck and sat in it briefly. Then, I decided that I'd rather scale the fence with no one watching. It's an eight foot cyclone fence that I could have climbed easily when I was in my twenties. Not so easily at sixty-seven. I hoped no cars would go by and think I was trying to escape after stealing from the storage units.
First, I was able to pull myself up onto a large steel box that housed the motor for the gate. From there it became more challenging. The gate is topped with spikes (think Trump's wall). The fence itself was topped with razor wire! There were really no footholds for me to use to get over the top. I decided to try a point where the gate and fence met. As I vaulted over the top - trying to get my large foot into the small squares of the fence - something let go and pitched me into the barbed wire!
I was in a PREDICTAMENT! I had no foothold and was feeling the barbs through my good down jacket and piercing my arm, I had very few choices. I ripped my arm loose and dropped myself to the ground, Somehow, in the process my jeans had also been shredded below the knee and were whipping in the wind. Quite a few cars had gone by during this escapade and I expected the police to arrive at any moment! I was disgusted, wounded and my self-esteem was flagging significantly!
Did I mention that it was dark - and the wind was blowing - and the temperature was dropping fast? It sure seemed to take Deb a long time to get here! I never imagined that Calla Road had so much traffic on a Wednesday evening! I must have looked VERY suspicious!
Anyway, she finally arrived and took me home where I nursed my wounds and settled into my chair for the evening.
The evening was uneventful until I crawled into bed. I take supplements three times a day: morning, noon and night. I take them with a full glass of cold spring water from our tap. I've been known to walk away from the sink leaving the water running. Once, I did it with the hot water; when I discovered it - it was running cold!
Anyway, as I was about to drift into a comfortable, healing sleep, Debbie stepped into the room and asked: "Do you have the water running in the kitchen for a reason?" I began to giggle and couldn't answer or stop! She began to laugh too! Needless to say, I went to bed happy - in spite of myself!
No comments:
Post a Comment