We're DIY gardeners
My honey and I are DIY people. When we wanted to put in a raised bed garden, we built and installed the beds in the yard. When our shed doors rotted off the hinges, we made new ones that matched our house and hung them together. We put up a new picket fence when we decided our old one was hideous. My honey did have his drill slip and put a screw into my foot during that project, but in his defense, I was wearing flip-flops.
However, my husband and I disagree on whether a handful of jobs should be DIY or done by a professional with the right equipment. When our short apple tree needs trimming, that is a DIY job. But we live in a very old neighborhood with very large and very tall trees. Like, really tall trees. To trim these, you need to be the owner of a boom truck or someone who climbs trees and trims for a living. My honey is neither and a little bit afraid of heights. I don't think he should be trimming tall trees.
In need of a tree trim
A few years ago, the tree in our front yard needed a significant trim. Branches were scraping the windows of my daughter’s third-floor windows. Wonderfully convenient for the squirrels who enjoyed this Pangea Bridge from tree to house, but not good for the roof. Honey was insistent that he could do it himself. He had a pole saw and a rope, and he could tie himself to our daughter’s bed, dangle out the third-story window, and trim the branches with a chainsaw.
Let me pause here to remind you that I live in a very tall house. My response was immediately no. After a reminder about how much life insurance we carried, we eventually hired a tree guy.
It will be simple, he said...
A few years later, we needed to cut back a branch from the walnut tree crowding our apple tree. This particular branch was only about 20 feet off the ground, and my husband insisted this was a DIY job. He had a pole saw and a tall ladder, and if I would just stand at the bottom of the ladder to keep it steady, he was sure he could cut through it quickly.
Let it be known I was against this plan from the beginning.
The pole saw was soon wedged in the branch while my honey stood at the tip top of the ladder, trying to figure out how to get it unstuck. He planned to yank as hard as he could without losing his balance while I stood at the bottom to steady the ladder. Again, I was against this plan because I worried that if the pole saw did come loose, it would swing all the way around and hit me.
But he yanked. I stayed. And the pole saw did swing all the way around, coming within a foot of my face.
Needless to say, tree trimming is no longer on our list of DIY jobs.
When Jamie isn’t actively avoiding being sawed in half by her well-meaning honey, their newest hobby is ballroom dancing. They’ve spent the last year learning how to rumba, cha-cha, and swing dance and are having the best time dancing twice a week.
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