Longest day of my life story

Ever done something stupid?  I mean day after day risk your life for a little money stupid?

I was trying to make some money for my wife and I to live off of while I was going to be doing my student teaching.  We had a 1 year old at the time.  I got a call to give a bid to paint a house in north Tacoma by Stadium HS.  It was a big house but as I walked around from the front to the side I realized I was in serious trouble.  The ground dropped off quickly as you went from the front of the house to the back and the big two story house quickly became a monstrously huge 4 story house.  As I looked up, I just gulped and thought to myself, "How am I going to get up there?"  Then I just decided that I could do anything in a day and every time I didn't know how I was going to reach an area of the side of the house, I would simply call that section a 'day' as I walked around the house figuring out my bid.  I figured out my bid and even adding on some money for combat pay and I still got the job because I was an idiot who had no business painting this house and I totally underbid the job.

I saved the dangerous days for Saturday.  Every morning I would give my wife a hug and a kiss before I left, but on these Saturdays, I would hold her longer and say, "Good bye."  I would really mean it because I didn't know if I was going to be coming back that night.  On these Saturdays, I would go there with one helper.  We would each lean a ladder against the house some 14 ft apart.  Then we would climb up and hang ladder jacks horizontally parallel to each other on rungs of each ladder.  Then we would climb up with an aluminum plank and rest it on the ladder jacks making a one foot wide walkway some 20 ft up in the air.  This wasn't even close to being high enough.  So then we each would carry up another 28 ft extension ladder on to the plank and lean them against the house.  Then repeat the ladder jacks and aluminum plank process.  In essence, we piggy backed the ladders.  SCARY.  Do not dare try this at your house.  Once the last plank was in place, we would climb down and I would tell my helper to stay on the other side of the house no matter what.

The first time we did this, we had to place the ladders in the neighbors yard, as the fence was close to the house, and also because we had to kick the ladders out to prevent them from being too vertical.  The ground sloped steeply, so we had to block up the lower foot pad on each ladder with pieces of wood so each ladder would stay vertical.  It took us about an hour to get it all set up.  My HS worker was so scared just helping set it up.  I was scared on the inside, but I believed I needed to simply get it done.  So I climbed with my scraper and a bucket of primer up the first ladder.  Then I reached up and placed them above me onto the first plank.  Then I climbed up onto the plank, grabbed up my scraper and primer and headed up the second ladder.  When I reach the second plank, I reached up and placed my scraper and primer on it.  Now I was freaking out.  Everything in me was telling me to abort this mission.  I put my head down and prayed and asked God to protect me from my on stupidity.  Then I climbed up onto the second plank.  I was so stinking HIGH.  I just froze.  There was nothing for me to hang onto for safety or comfort.  I looked down at the maze of ladders and planks below me and believed with all my heart that I was going to die that day.  Then I decided I should test out the set up... so I gave a quick downward thrust with my weight and everything just swayed in and out and back and forth below me... but that was it... I was still alive.  At my height, I didn't need to worry about getting hurt from falling.  I was at certain death height.  Also, BONUS, the earlier mentioned fence was right below me, so I figured it would aid to my certain death when I fell.  I just couldn't hardly move for quiet a while.  Finally, I realized that if I wanted to get off this plank I needed to get the work done up there, so I started scraping... very slowly and cautiously at first but after a while I really started working hard.  I was feeling better.  I was starting to believe that I WAS GOING TO BE OK.

Then I heard a thud and a groan.

Then I heard more thuds and more groans.  I looked around and couldn't see anything even though I had quite a view.  Then I looked down and to my horror I saw the root cause of the thuds and groans. There in the neighbors yard where the bottoms of the lower ladders were, was a man around 30 years old.  His hair was a mess and his plaid shirt just hung on him.  He was meandering around the yard with a hoe(garden tool variety... not the other kind) and every once in a while he would stop and take a violent whack at the ground with his hoe and let out a groan.  He just didn't stop doing this.  There I stood frozen, waiting for the inevitable.  He would occasionally circle by close to my ladders at which point I would gasp in fear, but then he would wander off and whack the ground somewhere else.  I was certain he would go after my ladders or the blocks of wood that supported them and me but it just never happened.  After about 15 minutes of watching him in helpless horror, I decided that the only way to get off this plank was to get the job done so I turned my attention to my work and tried my best to ignore what I thought was the inevitable.

At lunch time I climbed down to eat.  The man's mother came out to call her son in for lunch.  We talked briefly.  I asked if her son could stay inside, but she told me that he like to walk around the yard with his hoe.  He got to come home once a month from Western State Hospital and this was my lucky day.  I should have dismantled the set up for another day but it took so long to set up and I had it in my mind to get that high section done that day, so after lunch I climbed back up there and worked until I finished.  The entire time that psycho man wandered around below me whacking at the ground and groaning every 5 to 10 seconds.  It took me until about 7pm to finish the high section.

It was and still is the longest day of my life.  I worked for about 10 hours expecting to die at any moment.

I had to make more of the piggy back set ups on two of the other sides of the house... but I didn't have to worry about my ladders being knocked out from underneath me by an out-patient from a psycho ward.  God has been so good to me... especially when I've been stubborn and stupid.  GRACE.  Amazing Grace.