The John Griff Column: Point the finger...
It is a very familiar and much used phrase. ‘Point the finger at someone and you’ll find three more of your own pointing backwards at you’. Anatomically accurate as the phrase might prove to be for most, the sage message behind the words is clear. Don’t point the finger in case it reflects badly on you as the pointer - or accuser. How well founded is the verbal wisdom though?
Over the Easter weekend I found it to be highly accurate. I also found it to be costly, as my bank account will soon to be able to testify. On Good Friday I finally got round to one of those ‘round tuit’ jobs. Everyone has them. The kinds of jobs which we sign up to do and then put off over and over again. Such has been the case with me about nine months ago. I had said that I would fix one of a string of security lights that I had installed in our garden almost a decade before. One of them was faulty and only shining dimly. It was a simple enough job to complete – but somehow life got in the way of actually getting down to – so the light remained unfixed. For about four months.
Eventually I sourced a replacement light – but still I managed to contrive not to actually put the thing in place. Instead, it sat on my workbench in the shed, glaringly at me from inside it’s box. By this stage we were into long, dark nights and cold, wet days – hardly conducive towards sitting under a large laurel bush with a screwdriver in one hand and a pair of wirestrippers in the other. And so, the job continued to remain incomplete.
My conscience finally got the better of me on Good Friday. Temperatures had risen, it was a bright, dry day and with bank holiday resolve (what is it about DIY on such weekends?) I finally dived under the hedge to start the job. I had been taught well my former engineer father to have all the parts and tools ready for a job before starting it. Now, with a full nine months of preparation time I was fully ready to get cracking. And so I got down to business.
Before long I had taken the old light down from its bracket, stripped the wires for the new connection and offered the new unit into place. All that remained was to make the connections, test the light with the power back on, reset the sensor and, if all was well, clear up.
Making the connections called for close up working, so I took off my glasses to be able to see more easily. I put them in a toolbox tray alongside me, into which I had placed all the various tools and components for the job. Close up to the garden wall, I now got things done reasonably quickly, having previously wired up countless plugs and light fittings in the past. Now though, I couldn’t find my glasses to check my handiwork. If, like me, you also wear them, you will know how frustrating it can be to have to search for and not find something so fundamental to your existence. So it was for me now.
Roughly two minutes later I heard an exclamation from behind me – ‘Oh!’. Lois had come out into the garden with a coffee for me – and had found Ella, our young dog, with my glasses in her mouth. Or rather, in her teeth. Silently, she had crept up, taken then from the toolbox and was now delightedly chewing them, frames, lenses and all, in the middle of the lawn. Although still intact, the glasses were notably pockmarked from their canine encounter and, as such, ruined. As best I could I cleaned them, finished the light installation and went inside.
On Saturday I went into the opticians and sheepishly explained what had happened. The staff member I spoke too broke out a huge grin at my news. ‘You’re not the only person it’s happened to’ she said as my ‘my dog ate my homework’-esque story reached its conclusion. An hour later and a two-year interest-free deal signed, a new pair of glasses (and a spare) are being prepared.
As she always does, Ella gave me a warm, tail wagging welcome when I got home. I really couldn’t point the finger of blame at her because there wasn’t much to blame her for. And in any case my own three fingers would have told me what an idiot I had been to put the glasses where she could find them I the first place. Perhaps there’s a parallel there for a few world leaders to note right now.
Maddenlingly, one of the other garden lights has now failed, so I still have work to do. I plan not to leave it nine months to replace it – but you know what happens to the best laid plans. When I finally do get round to do it though, I’ll make sure to put my glasses out of harm’s way…