Always Lift With Your Back
Drove out of my development the other day, saw a young couple, and another young woman, who stood by a small, white SUV, hatch back open and the tail end of a couch hung out over the pavement. The three stared at the car, puzzled looks stamped on their faces.
I stopped, rolled down my window and asked if they needed a hand.
The man looked a bit surprised, then said, “Yes, if you can, thanks”.
I parked and joined the small group. Looked simple enough, grabbed the back end, they pushed from the inside, I pulled from the outside, but the couch didn’t move.
They got it in, it should come out.
Pushed and pulled for a few minutes, then the one woman realized the couch was caught on a small lip inside the car. Needed to lift the couch, but no room for that, so we rocked it back and forth, up and down, until half-inch by half-inch we walked it out of the car and onto the street.
“I can’t walk backwards,” I said immediately and took my place at one end of the couch. The man, about twenty-years-old, took his spot on the other.
Baby steps, I couldn’t see the ground, and as we headed toward a curb, I said to stop. I moved my foot, inch at a time, until it touched the curb. Then, slow lifted each foot until I was on the grass.
“OK,” I said, and continued the slow trek across the lawn.
Carrying a couch at my age, is like dog years, it takes seven times as long to get to where you are going.
Finally, as we reached the back deck, came across a small bricked garden with barb wire around it.
Barb wire??
I need to step over that in order to line up the couch with the stairs.
It was a pretty big step for an old man who carried the back end of a stranger’s couch.
I should have just kept driving.
Maneuvered above, around, and through the garden, and pushed the couch across the finish line.
It rested squarely on the end of the deck; they could take it from there.
Thanks were tossed around, and I headed back to my car.
Once there, with a heart that pounded in my chest, and aches in both arms and back, I thought, ‘what the hell did I just do?’
At sixty-four, retirement going on three years now, I’m one misstep from ending up in the hospital.
I like to help people, but next time I think I’ll drive by, wish those kids the best of luck, and be on my way.
That’s still helping, right?
Photo by: Joyce McCown .
