Drop Your Hammer

February 2002

I lowered a spinning saw blade down through gray siding. It was cold and I had no idea what I was doing here.

For all of my life, I’d generally thought that God had a plan for me and if I waited long enough it would become apparent. I watched the excess siding fall into the snow and decided that it was pretty clear that that was no longer the case.

An injury in Ranger School had led me out of the Army and my military resume was a square peg in the round hole of the civilian job market. I was the weak Number Two Man in a two-man construction crew. To be a successful carpenter requires an innate understanding of how material objects can fit together in a beautiful manner. I couldn’t even find the puzzle, much less put it together.

I was the cut-and-carry guy while Shane, my boss, worked his magic. One look at my hammer made it clear how bad of a cut-and-carry guy I was. It was monstrosity of gleaming metal and dull wood. The metal gleamed because it was so huge that I could barely swing it.

The clerk at Big R Ranch Supply who was helping me picked out tools had asked me how big of a hammer I swing. My cocky reply of “as big as you’ve got” left me with a brutal tool that would have been more useful prying someone out of a crashed car than framing a house.

Four years of West Point in order to be the worst construction worker in Helena, Montana? I’d given up on a divine plan, but I did need the ten bucks an hour. I picked up the cut of siding, walked over to the house, and raised it up to Shane.

Over the next two days we finished up the siding. The snow had melted then it froze and snowed again. Shane was up on the roof sweeping off snow so it wouldn’t melt and send water down onto the still-new masonry.

I was busy trying to look busy until Shane gave me another task. That generally involved carrying things from one part of the construction site to another part where they might be more useful.

I set another bundle of siding down by the saw. I heard a voice say, “Take off your hammer.”

I looked back at Shane, but the voice wasn’t his. He was still sweeping the snow off the roof. I glanced down at my hammer and then looked forward at the saw.

“Take off your hammer,” said the strong feminine voice.

I looked around again, but the voice wasn’t coming through the cold air. I protested internally. I can’t take off my hammer. I’m a bad enough construction worker anyway. I don’t need to point it out by gallivanting around without a hammer.”

“Go to the ladder.”

I didn’t want to disagree twice. I walked over to the metal ladder and looked up at Shane swiping the little green broom back and forth. The fresh snow tumbled off of the roof and onto my face.

I silently cursed the voice and wished my knit cap had a visor.

“He’s coming down.”

My head snapped up. I watched Shane stretch the broom wider then he grunted and slipped. The grunt turned into a yell as his body slid over the icy shingles. This lower body launched into the cold air. Shane grabbed for the edge of the roof, hoping to stop his fall. The feet pendulummed down towards the house and he fell again, now headfirst towards the concrete below.

I took a step to my right and lifted my hands, remembering the words of a military climbing instructor – brace don’t catch. I planted my hands against his dropping shoulders. I somehow remembered the hammer and shifted my right hip away from his falling body. Shane’s full weight hit me and plowed us both into the concrete.

I thought he died. Shane was unconscious. Blood soaked out of the hood of his sweatshirt. I called 911. Shane started breathing again. I tried to comfort him as the paramedics came. “It’s going to be alright. You’re going to be alright…”

I broke down after the ambulance pulled away to take him to the hospital.

Shane ended up with a concussion, broken collarbone, and a few broken ribs. They said he probably would have died if he hadn’t landed on me. Shane’s wife still has a husband and his kids still have their father.

I didn’t know how to say it at the time without sounding crazy (clearly I’m not worried about that anymore), but I knew that it wasn’t me that saved him. If anything, I probably botched my role. In better hands, Shane might not have even hit the ground. Thank God, I remembered the warning about the hammer. If I hadn’t have turned my hips, it would have went right through him.

I’ve wracked by brain for almost nine years trying to figure out the events of that day, why I received that warning, and why I haven’t had the same warning for other loved one that I’ve lost. I don’t have any hard answers, but I do have my own conclusions and hopefully I’m more courageous about telling them than I was about telling the truth about what happened then.

The only undeniable conclusion that I’ve come is that if a voice ever tells you to take your hammer off your tool belt - do it. Keeping your job is about to become the least of your worries.