A Dying Breed
I spent yesterday afternoon stuck in the attic space adjacent to the room over our garage. It was close to 95 degrees outside, and probably 120 or 130 in the space I was in. I had put off fixing the insulation in this space during the spring when it was pleasant, and so as a way to both punish myself for procrastination and to start fixing a real problem I woke up Saturday morning and decided I had to get at least one side of it done that day.
I can’t tell you how fun it was to be wearing a long sleeve shirt and gloves, handling fiberglass insulation, and sweating at a rate that I can never remember in my life. It was a lethal combination. By the end of the afternoon, I am sure I had lost five to ten pounds being in there, a weight I gladly made up at dinner last night. I have to say, however, that it felt good to do my own work.
I live in a neighborhood where no one under the age of 50 does their own work anymore. Everyone pays to get their grass cut, pays to have someone rake their leaves, pays to have a room painted, or whatever else is required. What I find particularly interesting is that there are two older couples that live on my street, and they all do their own work. It can be 90 degrees out ( or 25 degrees for that matter ) and they will be out there trimming their own hedges, mowing their lawn and shoveling their driveways in the wintertime. I like working on my house. I like the satisfaction of looking at something and knowing I did it. But, people like me in my age group are just not common anymore. There is a guy at least 10 years younger than me that has someone else mow his yard.
I don’t know why this sort of thing bothers me, but it does.
