Carrie Classon
My father has been having trouble with his legs, and tasks that involve getting up from the ground are hard for him, particularly if the ground is steep or slippery – and that is a pretty accurate description of the shoreline where the dock lives over the winter.
But we both thought the dock should get in the water, and I told my dad I’d help, so we made our way down to the shoreline to tackle the project.
We had a few things working against us.
The ground, as I mentioned, is very steep, and it was slick with last year’s leaves. The dock had wheels at the end and was tacked on to a frame on the hill. It had to be loosened from the frame so it could slide down into the water. This is a task that used to take my dad no time at all, but instead of doing it himself, he had to instruct his daughter on how to do it, and his daughter has no demonstrable engineering skills.
And that wasn’t the full extent of the problem, because my dad’s eyesight is not good, so he couldn’t really see what I was up to. He had to describe what I should be doing without being able to see if I was doing it.
Then the last screw holding the dock in place got stuck. I am sure that screw was stuck due to operator error (I use a screwdriver approximately once every five years) but whatever the cause, the screw was jammed and the whole thing was hung up. We surveyed the situation.
“I don’t think it’s coming loose,” my dad concluded.
“What if we hit it with a hammer?” I suggested. Hitting things with hammers was something I felt qualified to try.
“No…” My dad was thinking. “Can you just push it?”
My dad suspected there wasn’t much holding the dock in place and, once it was free, it would merrily roll down the hill on its own accord.
“I don’t know if I can push it. But I can kick it.” And so I did. I sat on my butt in the slippery leaves, and I kicked the dock. The little chunk of two-by-six with the one remaining screw holding it in place split into two, and the dock came loose with a mighty “whoosh!” and rolled down the hill.
Fortunately, both my dad and I were out of the way.
“I don’t know where that block went,” I told my dad.
“Forget about it,” he said.
We got the dock into the water. It was a little cattywampus, but it was more or less ready for another season.
“I might need to get a kid to help me with some things this fall,” my dad said, as if this was a major concession at 92. He thanked me for helping him and apologized for needing the help.
“Dad, we all do as much as we can, for as long as we’re able.”
“I guess that’s so.”
That night, I saw a boat trolling along the shoreline as the sun set.
“Hey, Dad, there’s a guy fishing right off the end of the dock.”
“I hope he knows the rules,” my dad said.
“The rules?”
“He’s gotta leave half of whatever he catches at the end of the dock for me.”
“We’ll have to put up a sign on the shoreline so he knows the rules,” I told my dad.
“We’ll have to do that,” my dad said.
Till next time,
Carrie
