Be a man

Yesterday I did the husbandy dad family man thing and hung our Christmas lights. Between nearing actual tears from being so cold and feeling genuine fear of sliding then plummeting to my shame, they got hung. Now grant it, and don't judge me, I did wear my Krocs which in hindsight, I know, absolutely retarded idea. Turns out the holes aren't just for show, snow can actually get through. As far as plummeting to my shame; when your house is only 15-20ft tall you won't die if you fall, but you surely will be seen and heard by the men who are putting in your windows as well as your wife and kids as you slide off the roof screaming like a girl while frantically twisting and turning your paniced body as you try to grab onto an eave, which btw is a bad bad idea. Plus your Krocs didn't supply the needed grip to cease the slide. Now couple that with the fact that heights were my number one fear until a few years ago where I finally congquered it by, well, not going anywhere high but still. . . Also I didn't have my own ladder. Don't know what I was thinking actually- "just jump john, you could dunk a decade ago so surely with a good warmup you could leap up on your roof, with lights in hand." Gees I'm such a. . .no words really. So I asked our friendly window installers if "they were using their ladder cause I had some lights to put up you know." They looked at me like the moron I was and said "uh, well we're kinda using it; translation -"are you stupid" but then helpfully suggested "we're going on a smoke break in a few minutes so I suppose you could use it then"; translation "We need a smoke or we're going to kill this guy." Fast forward 2 minutes and there I am on the roof, yeah I was, but I've realized that A. I don't have all the stuff I need and B. I'm on the wrong section. Fast forward 20 minutes where I finally got up the courage to say "Hey guys, so, it turns out I don't have my stuff so could ya be a pal and help me down." Fast forward 10 minutes, the amount of time it takes me to get down off the icy, frightening platform of hell. And I'm down.

I immediatly realized how retarded I must have come across so I brought them some shortbread cookies as a peace offering. They stopped laughing at my stupidity long enough to devor them and thank me.

So they're happy finally, but the lights still aren't hung and yes, my gear is still on the roof. After an hour inside, warming up and enduring frequent encouragements or commands from my wife- to "be her man" I finally was. I marched on out there, asked the window men to help me get back on the horse, I mean roof, and never looked back. The lights are hung and they look great. And I think by then end I was a man again. A family man. Which we watched later that night. Good movie by the way. As for the window men, they never finished and one of the windows they did install has a crack in it all they way across. So, as I'm about to drive off to visit Journey for the first time, they're here on a Sunday, finishing what they started.

Who's the man now?

John

P.S. The Oilers on the other hand, lost yet another man, and well, could be in trouble. Hope not.