Successes and Failures-Safety Third

 I am going to be posting about the successes and failures in the gardens as on ongoing theme. Everyone who gardens will not have one without the other. At least that has been my experience. But remember that failures and successes do not define who you are. Who you are is determined by what you do with your successes and failures. There is much to learn from both your failures and your successes. Most of these posts will be about the garden. But when I came across this picture, I had to start with a more personal one.

You can teach an old coot new tricks!

I spent 59 years without using safety glasses. I was rather proud of that fact. The only minor complication was an occasional piece of trash in the eye that healed in a short time. That was until two years ago.

I was building this chicken tractor. Yes. We have chickens. 

Anyway, where was I? I was building this tractor. I had the grinder, from the first picture, in my hand. As usual, I had no eye protection. After all, eye protection was for sissies. Then the unexpected happened.

A small sliver of rusty tin buried itself in my right eye. Initially I thought I just had a bit of trash in my eye. Things went down hill from there. Fortunately, we have the Callahan Eye Clinic in Birmingham. They were able to get me in to see Dr. John Parker the next morning. My first experience with Dr. Parker was not a pleasant one. He had the tweezers and I was trying to keep my head absolutely still while he removed the sliver from my eye. But here is where God's providence came in. Dr. Parker is one of the best cornea doctors around. My vision had been diminishing over the previous years. He was able to look at my eyes and see the cataracts that were developing and even take some baseline images of my eyes for reference if I had cataract surgery. I have now had both eyes corrected by him. It has been a blessing to get to know him professionally and as a brother in Christ.
 
There are several lessons here in this failure and success. To begin with, make it a priority to wear eye protection when using power tools. Dr. Parker is even suggesting that I wear a hat to prevent macular degeneration at my age. That one is a tough habit to form, but I am working on it. The second lesson is, do not let Precious Virginia catch Marvelous Mark using power tools without eye protection any more. Enough said on that one. The third lesson is that God is at work even in our "failures." He can work to redeem a knucklehead putting a piece of metal in his own eye. What can he do in your life? Think about it.

MM