How to Disempower a Fear

I turned to face a demon that's been haunting me for fifteen years this past weekend. 

This demon was different from the others in that it was an actual physical fear. I live in my head too much. Way too much. My default experience in battling demons is internal: the fear of failure, imposter syndrome, forgiveness, resistance, persistence, grit...the list goes on and on.

But this fear has been right in front of my eyes -- or rather just beyond what I could see. 

It's a janky modification to the deck in the back of my home, done by, local lore tells me, the lost-his-way son-in-law of the family that lived here prior who had some money issues so he "helped around the house." Anyone with a little common sense would know this guy didn't have much of it, nor much experience with the trades. It looked like a total hack job.

The boundary of my fear was with overlapping sheets of corrugated galvanized steel that were nailed to the bottom of a second floor outdoor Douglas fir deck.

They were ugly, but more importantly, entirely weatherproof. And the first time I saw them, a soft alarm shuddered through my body: that sure doesn't look right -- where would the water go? 

The answer was pretty much nowhere - anytime it rained or whenever the plants were watered, it was going to collect and pool underneath the wooden beams supporting the deck, and the barbecue, and planters -- and the kids playing!

I ignored that alarm bell actively. I turned away from it. I didn't know what was under there. I didn't want to know.

But, I actually did want to know. And this past weekend, something overtook me and finally, after a decade and a half, I took a crowbar, pry bar, and hammer from the garage and with a strange and extreme sense of patience and calm, dragged out the ladder took to pulling the sheets down.

As the saying goes, the best time to plant a shade tree is twenty years ago. The second best time is today.

I had no idea what I'd find. My worst fear was that the support beams would not only be completely rotted away, but that the water would have seeped into the interior of the structure. This might mean that the entire back of the house would need to be ripped off and the beams replaced. Best case scenario, I figured there'd be significant rot that could be cut away, sanded down, weatherproofed and left to be.

At this point, it doesn't really matter what the outcome was. The thing is now I know. And it was liberating. 

All these years, not knowing.

It reminds me of great classic films like Psycho or Jaws or Bambi, where the violence or implied violence takes place off screen. One's own imagination has the potential to manufacture and produce fearful and revolting images beyond whatever singular representation a director might choose to put on screen.

It was bad under the deck. But it wasn't as bad as it could be. And now I know what fifteen years of collected soot looks like.

It's an interesting process to go through. Fear turns into, not quite relief, but strange sense of wisdom. A knowing. Trepidation transforms into confidence. The old will be replaced with the new. Dissatisfaction with achievement. 

The fear is gone. There's no place for it to exist anymore. I really don't know what compelled me to finally take action. I got out of my head and I just did it. Now, I'm carrying that spirit of action with me. Following my gut, so to speak. Taking care of the cobwebs. Seeking clarity.

I wonder what else I've been carrying around far too long that I can finally turn and face as well. 

I'm destined to find out.