Outside my office we have one of these big antenna structures. It’s a couple hundred feet high. Its right off 183, and sometimes when I pass by with a group of friends in a car, I’ll point it out and tell them that is where I work, in the building under the big antenna.
Then I say “That antenna? I built it!”
They look at me and one will say ‘Really?” and almost before they have finished saying “Really?”, I will reply “No” and we all laugh and its pretty good fun.
Anyway, a couple times a year they send some dudes out to work up at the top of the antenna.
They were out there this morning, suiting up.
One of the guys, probably 25 years old, good looking kid with a soul patch and “Rusted Root” T-shirt on, he looked up as I was passing by, and so I stopped.
I said ‘Man, whats it like up there on a pretty morning like this”
He grinned and said “Dude its beautiful up there.”
“So you love your job?”
“Oh yeah, I wouldn’t trade places with anyone. It’s a good workout too”
“Yeah, I bet it is. Have a good day” I said and moved along into my office.
I stopped there, but there was so much more I wanted to ask him.
I wanted to ask if he ever got that sinking feeling in his belly like I do when I’m looking out a third floor window.
I wanted to ask him if he ever felt like gravity was sucking him over the edge of something, and had to approach the edge of a roof, or a cliff, on his hands and knees to keep from throwing himself off.
I wanted to tell him that it gave me the heebie-jeebies just to go across an overpass in my car, and ask if he ever felt that way.
I wanted to ask what his dreams might be like, if he imagined himself like that Red Bull guy, and had dreams where he fellandfellandfelldowndowndown for longlonglong time; or dreams like mine where I can float and land softly from a fall that would otherwise kill me; or leap over houses drifting through the old neighborhood, past the High School parking lot, eventually landing smack dab in the middle of a Keg Party at Grapevine Lake, surrounded by spawning redheaded beachcombers in Artic Patrol hats.
But I didn’t ask him any of that stuff.
I didn’t want to jinx him, and that is what it surely would have done.
5 comments:
I'm still here, Steve! You're as good as ever.
What;s this thing about proving I'm not a robot... iDowsla? oh well. Greetings, Steve!
P.S. If you're worreing about a decrease in comments, it's prbably because of your Gestapo-like word-identification screening. It's near-impossible to post a comment, Steve!
Rock on!
No, I'm not too worried about a decerasing number of comments. I'm mildly worried about a lack of anything I care to post.
Hi martjin!
P.S. I even had to prove I'm not a robot. Take me to your leader.
Good point, Steve, about the jinxing!
I used to meet a guy who worked, in the 1950s and 60s, all over the world, on radio masts and tv towers. He had a heap of stories, not all of them reassuring. But oh my, I was so jealous. I see those things, and I do so want to see the view from the top.
He'd talk of climbing, in the early morning, through cold wet mist, then breaking out into the sunlight, where the mast he was climbing was the only thing visible above a white sea of cloud that stretched as far as the eye could see.
And, working on another mast, at 1270ft, being narrowly missed by a very frightened looking small plane pilot.
Yeah Souby, I was really glad I kept my mouth shut.
You do some work at heights don't you?
I couldnt do it. I get a few feet off the ground,and my balls start to tighten. I can really feel the devil around my nutsack.
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