A mostly fun day

I had a little list tasks to accomplish today, and then the remainder of the day to squander as I would. And since this was my third day in a row off work - a thing that very seldom happens – I felt quite perky. When Rebecca called to see if I wanted to go the knitting store, I was pleased and surprised, for I hadn’t realized that she had the day off as well. To get to the knitting store, one must choose between two bridges over the ship canal, and we usually go over the Montlake Bridge and then walk through the University of Washington. Unfortunately, like my mother, standing on a chair to put in a light bulb makes me ill, and walking across these bridges is not my idea of fun at all. I just steel myself and forge on trying never to look down. We had not walked across the University Bridge in quite some time, and I remembered it as being worse than the other one, but I had forgotten how very much worse it actually is. Both of the bridges draw up for big boats, so the floors of them are hideous grates, through which one can see the actual water several miles below. Sickening! The sidewalk of the Montlake bridge is about five feet wide and the rails are attached to the sidewalk. On the University bridge, I now realized, the sidewalks are about five inches wide and there is a great chasm on either side, where the sidewalk is attached neither to the railing nor to the grate. It’s just suspended in midair. Super sickening. Initially, I was feeling quite brave and thinking it would all be okay as I took the first picture, but then I realized that we were not actually on the bridge yet, but rather, we were on the parapet just before it. Rebecca, feeling frolicsome, nearly flung herself over the edge, no doubt to upset me – which it certainly did, because I grabbed her back to save her from the abyss, and injured her knee in the process. Her wound is pictured here. Then we got on the actual bridge. I could not believe it. I was overwhelmed with terror and could barely make my way across. I kept telling myself that I was being ridiculous and there was no danger whatever, but that didn’t seem to help. I was almost paralyzed with fear and had real tears streaming down. I knew I was being was absolutely absurd. My mother did this sort of thing occasionally, and I was always outraged. Bad me! Between her gales of rude laughter, Rebecca kept offering words of encouragement. I kept telling her to stop talking, be quiet and just keep walking so it would get over with. Plus, I needed to concentrate in not falling over the edge. Later, she apologized for laughing, but I said I would have laughed at myself too if I had not been me. She admitted that she wanted to take a picture of me, but realized that that would be going too far. It certainly would. I hate having my picture taken at the best of times.
Once across the bridge, we had a nice time buying yarn, and there were no more terrors.
Also pictured here are some of the trees we passed on our way - while we were still safely on solid ground.