No Faking It

I am a “fake it ‘til you make it” person all day long. It started young with me. At four I lived on Crystal St. In New Canaan and all the kids going to South School walked up our street to get to school. I would often have a lemonade and cookie stand, selling what ever I could get my hands on. I was too young to know how to add, but that never stopped me from up selling every customer, “Are you sure you don’t want an Oreo with that lemonade?”
What I have found is that the older you get the less you need to fake it because skills you have learned are transferable to other things. Also, you just gain a wealth of knowledge from living that you don’t know you will ever use, until you do.
Today was a perfect example of both faking it and using a lifetime of gathered knowledge. In the work to be done getting my friends house ready to sell today I got to do many different tasks, most of them I had either seen done in 25 years of watching this old house or repurposing a skill I already had.
One example was the concrete work I got to do to fill cracks in outdoor steps. Warren mixed the quick create to my instructions making it the consistency of frosting. I used my cake decorating talents to fill the hole and smooth the surface. Building up a corner was not unlike making a Christmas ornament out of foam.
Refinishing a floor to bring out the beauty of old wood was the same as mopping a floor. A skill I wish I did not have to use so often. Painting trim was much easier than painting a picture. Of course the thing I did best while I was here was provide meals. The skill I use everyday.
I have spent the last few days being here to help my friends. Supporting Warren and Donna through the pain of losing their mother and getting her house ready to sell is not something I had to fake. Warren and I figured out we have been friends for forty years. There is nothing fake about that. I am glad I was able to use my lifetime of accumulated knowledge for the good of a friend who has never been fake to me.