The late James J. Kilpatrick was one of my literary idols. He wrote The Writer’s Art, a syndicated newspaper column, and a book of the same name. “Read your copy,” he famously advised young and experienced writers. Examine your copy. “Please read your copy.” Reading one’s own writing enables us to see flaws in flow, syntax, grammar, and spelling.
Because of an incident that occurred recently, I’m thinking of a corollary to Mr. Kilpatrick’s caution today. “Wear your safety glasses,” says the warning. Put on your safety glasses. Put on your safety glasses.”
Regret is absolutely one of the worst emotions that you could ever hope to experience because many times, the act (or lack of an act) that caused the regret was preventable. The really weird part of this story is that as I walked across the store to perform the function that caused my injury, I was thinking to myself, “I’m going to be working over my head.” I really should shield my eyes because I don’t want anything bad to happen.”
I was installing some new latches in the area where I keep hand tools that are not in use. Screws for the latch side of the hinge are typically excessively long when creating these hatches and must be reduced. I could’ve done it in a very lovely, elegant way, but I wanted to get it done quickly, so I used a 4′′ angle grinder. A quarter-inch screw is sticking through, and it takes approximately three seconds to grind it off. However, the process produces a hot tiny residue that sometimes burns straight into the wood and sometimes flies off to who knows where. When working on a benchtop, that’s usually not an issue, but above your head? That is a different story!
The weirdest aspect was that I even thought ahead of time, “Man, if that slag got on my cornea (clear portion of the eye), it would be curtains for that eye.”
But I was in a rush, as I normally am, and I had my reading glasses on, so I thought I’d be extra cautious.
That’s right.
I squinted so hard that the top lids slammed on my face just below my right eye, burning me in three places with the hot screw tip.
There were four screws to grind down, and the first three went without a hitch. Few things are more damaging to one’s conduct than success, and the three screws’ success may have led to some complacency. Whatever the reason, when I arrived to the fourth one, ZING! The hot chunk of metal shoots out, heading directly towards my right eye. Thank God for the autonomic nervous system, the complicated network that governs all of the body’s activities that we don’t think about, such as breathing, heartbeat, and our bodies’ reactions to danger. My eyelid had slammed shut before I even realized there was a problem, leaving the three burn marks, which mimic folds in the strongly squinted eyelid.
I walked upstairs to check in the bathroom mirror, praying the whole while and was surprised at how little damage there was. Surprisingly, there was very little discomfort. And, happily, no harm was done to the real eyeball.
Clearly, things might have gone far worse. And far more painful.
I had a little more grinding to do, so I grabbed the adjacent safety glasses and finished the task.
I immediately murmured a prayer of thanksgiving for my freedom.
Oh and while I am thinking about it, there is one more incident that occurred recently – I was working with my electric miter saw without my safety glasses (yes I know I know!) and I only had one cut to make. I figured I’d be fine for just one cut – no problem! I was super careful, but before I knew it, a small splinter of wood flew off the saw and straight into my eye!
I had no time to react because I was so close to the saw monitoring the cut as I was making it…. Fortunately enough the splinter did not penetrate the eye, but it took me a good 30 minutes and a red eye to get rid of it. Finally, success! The wood was completely gone out of my eye and there was no permanent damage.
So again, wear the damn safety glasses, Kyle!!