On Friday afternoon my wife finds me in the kitchen, staring blankly at some post.
“I wish you’d put up my picture,” she says. Her office has just been painted, and a very heavy picture needs re-hanging.
“I will,” I say. “But I’m busy.”
“Busy doing what, exactly?”
“Busy doing business,” I say. “I’m a businessman.”
“You are not a businessman,” she says. She tells me she’s just spent two hours moving the oldest one’s stuff into the middle one’s room.
“Why?” I say.
“Because the room is being repainted tomorrow,” she says. I think about this for a long moment.
“If the room is being painted,” I say, “I should really fix the window first.” The oldest one’s window hasn’t opened for many years.
“Yeah, right,” my wife says.
“I can do it now,” I say. “It’ll take me an hour.”
“I thought you were busy,” she says. “What about my picture?” I think about this for another long moment.
“The window,” I say, “has become a priority.” The oldest one slopes into the room and opens the fridge.
“Make him help you, then,” says my wife. “He’s done nothing today, either.”
When I say that I can repair a window, I mean that I did it once eight years ago, and as a consequence still own several metres of sash cord. I locate the cord, along with some tools I think I might need. It takes me a bit longer to find the oldest one, who is sitting in the garden.
“We may begin,” I say.
“Coming,” he says.
By the time the boy joins me upstairs – now accompanied by his friend Eddie – I have been banging a chisel into the window frame for some time.
“Welcome,” I say. “You’re just in time to see me remove what is known in sash window repair circles as the inner staff beading.” I hit the chisel with the hammer. Paint cracks. Wood parts from wood with a splintering sound.
“Why are we doing this?” says the oldest one.
“With the beading removed, the lower sash comes away easily,” I say.
“You doing anything later?” the oldest one says to Eddie.
“Dunno,” says Eddie.
“This panel, which conceals the sash weight, is simply pried free,” I say. The screwdriver flips from my hand and falls out the window, bouncing off the kitchen roof and landing with a sharp ring in next door’s gutter.
When I look down I see my neighbour looking up at me through her skylight. She waves, and I wave back.
Eventually I am able to remove the sash weights from the pockets inside the frame.
“Look upon these iron weights,” I say, “for they have not been seen in a hundred years.”
“Whoa,” says Eddie. I continue to narrate my repairs, fully aware that I am losing my audience. I don’t care: I have them more or less captive.
“Then, by tying this nail to a length of twine and letting its weight take it over the pulley,” I say, “I can pull the sash cord into position.”
“Clever,” says the oldest one.
“It’s possible I invented the technique,” I say.
After considerably more than an hour’s work, I have clean white cord tied to both weights and the sash back in its slot.
“Now it’s a simple matter of affixing the rope to the window,” I say, “using what is technically known as a clout nail.” I put nail to wood and draw back my hammer.
“Don’t you have to pull the weights up to the top first,” says Eddie, “so they can counterbalance the weight of the sash?”
I stare at him for a very long moment.
“So that’s why you’re here,” I say.
