Heights

I’ve always thought I was brave.

Apparently not.

My problem… Heights.

Heights scare me. Especially when it’s coupled with little or no safety. So bungy jumping and being in a tall building are all ok, but standing on a tall shaky ladder is not.

Recently I’ve been painting a lot. A lot of red to be precise. The cabin as well as the cow house walls. I thought I was done with the tall shaky ladder. But we met again. Unni decided that the wall on the side where the cows enter needed painting. And so we did. The wall is so high, we can only manage half of it using the tall shaky ladder. However, the ladder was able to take the adjacent wall. Provided I climbed close to the very top and stretchedddddddd all the way out.

First day I painted using the shaky ladder. I dreaded having to paint the very top coz the damn shaky ladder was freaking me out. Second day I mentioned to Unni that the ladder was kinda scary, and she offered to paint the top if I’d take the bottom. And so I went to paint. I took the top once and after a really long time painting very sloooowly, I finally painted 5 panels. Only. Being on a shaky ladder that high was just too scary for me to stomach. I did not like this one bit.

I stood at the bottom and surveyed the wall that was left unpainted. I would have to go all the way up the shaky ladder for at least another 5 times before the top most section was done. There was no taking the easy way out and getting Unni to do it…I’ve jumped into crevasses, abseiled and bungy jumped before, and I was gonna get my ass up on that damn ladder and finish the wall.

It reminded me of the MIR interview when the seniors had said that because I took a really long time to abseil like 5m, I had lacked the confidence and hence would be more likely to give up. Which was the most ridiculous and I must add, insulting thing I’ve ever heard. Coz if ever there’s anything I’m known for, it’s my mental capabilities. After which they proceeded to tell me that I was heading for doom if they sent me for the Technical Mountaineering Course and I’d surely bound not to survive there! Anyway, that whole incident’s a long story and I can probably write 3 books and set up a whole new blog on it. So wouldn’t bore you here with the details.

So tough luck, suck it up. I was going to take the wall no matter what. Usually I take walls from left to right, going from the top to the bottom, then the top to bottom again. This time I took all of the very top before going back to continue at the bottom. I finished the entire top section before tea time and boy was I glad it was done. Then I was able to switch to the shorter, more stable ladder to carry on paining the bottom section.

The whole wall was done before dinner, so the cows could come back to a freshly painted wall. Not that they’d care anyway, coz after the evening milk when I was walking the cows out, I noticed poop on the wall.

ARGH! Sometimes those cows just make me wanna murder them!