Today, we get to have an educational moment here at DLOG, for today we get to learn a new word. Today's word is acrophobia. Acrophobia, according to Wikipedia (for people too lazy to click a link) "is an extreme or irrational fear of heights". Why are we discussing it here?
'Cause I got it.
Oh I haven't been to a doctor for diagnosis or anything, standing firm on my policy of only seeing doctors for ailments that are visible from across the street, but I've got it. I know because this weekend I had to do a simple task that took way longer than it should have. We had some rotted wood replace on a second floor window, but didn't have it painted yet. Well, it had been a few weeks, and we were having a cookie decorating party for the Princess, so my lovely wife asked me to take care if of it. I'm not handy, but I know my way around a paintbrush, so I stepped up.
Well, sort of. While everyone else went to gymnastics, I dragged the 20 foot ladder outside and tried to get it against the house in an appropriate manner. Succeeding at that, I got myself an old peanut butter jar full of paint, a brush, stuffed both in my pockets, and climbed up the ladder. About half way up, I just stopped, hung out for a minute, and then climbed back down.
I made the pretense of checking that it was sturdy enough, adjusting the ladder a bit. Then I started climbing again. This time I made it to the top of the porch roof, a whopping ten feet in the air maybe, before I froze up. Now, it's hard to explain how strange this was for me. I knew I wasn't very far off of the ground. I looked down, and it didn't even look that far off the ground. Nonetheless, I literally couldn't make myself go further. So, once again I backed down, and went inside for a minute to gather myself.
Keep in mind, dear reader, that my glorified sense of importance makes this all the worse, as the whole time I'm doing this I'm imagining the neighbors looking out the windows, trying to figure out why I keep climbing the ladder and then coming back down. So far I'm okay, as the first one was poor ladder setup, and the second trip would probably be viewed as forgetting some needed item. This time, though, I had to make it, lest they quietly begin snickering to themselves.
So, out I go. I climb the ladder, and this time make it to my goal. Well, almost anyway. See, I got high enough on the ladder to reach the top of the area to be painted, so we were all good there. The only issue was that I couldn't make myself get the paint out. I'm literally standing at the top of this ladder (again, maybe a whole 15-17 feet of the ground now), and I'm saying to myself, "Dude, just reach into your coat pocket, pull the jar of paint out, and go". My hands chose to soundly ignore this request and instead chose to cling tenaciously to the rungs.
This would be bad, but soon I discovered that was the least of my problems. See, having apparently avoided heights with an efficiency previously unimagined, I discovered that not only were my hands being uncooperative, now my feet had joined the revolution. So now I'm standing at the top of the ladder, not painting, and unable to make myself climb down. My limbs had decided that I was not the one calling the shots anymore, and that they were in charge now. Thank goodness my colon remained loyal.
Anyway, I managed to get down, and almost a full hour (and a lot of pacing and talking to myself) later, I managed to get back up the ladder and start painting. What was odd was that as long as I was painting I was fine, but the second I stopped I could feel myself freezing up again. I've not experienced such a loss of physical control over my body in my life, and frankly it was as disturbing an experience as I've ever had. I'm sure I'll get over it in time, but I'm not in any hurry to try it again.
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