Good morning, y’all. You know how some people see a glass as being half full, and others see it as half empty? That’s supposed to be some sort of psychology trick that lets a psychologist tell you whether you’re an optimist or a pessimist, and then charge you a hundred dollars an hour for the insight. I’d say it’s as clever a trick as any other to try to label someone’s neuroses and psychoses. I just think it doesn’t give the complete picture.
I bring this up because the big pine tree I’ve been talking about for a couple of weeks has succumbed to gravity and made a god awful mess of itself here at TackyToo. In the lead up to the collapse, the optimist in me was saying, “that tree will hold until the weather gets drier”. At the same time, the pessimist in me was saying, “those tree climbers are going to charge an arm and a leg to climb up into that tree”. The pessimist was also concerned with the risk to life and limb. I figured the tree climbers would get up in that wet tree with the wind blowing and I’d have a huge lawsuit on my hands. Now, we’ll never know.
I guess it’s good that Mother Nature, in the form of gravity, took the decision out of my hands. If you were following along with my train of thought, you can see how the pessimist, “don’t act, it’s too dangerous”, fed the optimist, “no need to act, the tree will stay upright”. I don’t know if anyone else employs the same techniques to try to reinforce the fact that they’ve made the right decision. I guess you’d call it twisted logic, as opposed to a rationalization, which I also happen to be a master of.
Even at my advanced age, I realize that all of my financial decisions are still being shaped by my Daddy’s parsimony. Bocephus, or “Bo” Lite wouldn’t spend ten cents to watch Jesus bounce on a trampoline. How cheap was Daddy? He was so cheap that when he took us to McDonald’s he’d back through the drive through so that the window was on my side of the car. That’s how cheap. Whenever we needed anything, we had to first see if we could “make do”. There has never been a better “make do” person than Daddy. Need new shoes? You can “make do” by putting cardboard in the insoles. Need new jeans? You can “make do” by ironing patches over the holes. There’s not a need that my Daddy couldn’t find a “make do” for. So you can see my decision to put off expenses is well grounded, unlike the dearly departed pine tree.
Anyway, the pine tree came down with a huge thud and smushed the mail box at Number 24 like a beer can. Thank the Saints, the tree fell more or less straight down the driveway. A little to the left, and Number 24 would have been Number 23 and a half. A little to the right, and Number 54 would have been 00. Things have been real quiet at Number 54 since Mr. Pickles moved on to managed care. I’m glad Mr. Pickles wasn’t around for the tree fall. He might have taken the crash of the tree as an alien invasion and come out shooting. He was always quick to handle issues with his shotgun. This situation didn’t need a shotgun, just a bunch of chainsaws and a few strong backs.
Well, we got the driveway cleared in about an hour, and that’s even with the Right Reverend Dale E. Bread’s little monster, Devin, “helping”. I finally got Devin to head home by telling him I was concerned he might have picked up some pine beetles. While pretending to check Devin’s head for beetles, I told him about how insidious pine beetles could be. I may have “confused” pine beetles with the old superstitions about earwigs. What can I say, I’m old, I get confused sometimes.