If it had been December, I might have thought the sounds of dancing on my roof were reindeer hooves.
They had that rhythm with a catchy beat, not that I’ve ever heard them, but as I imagine them, which, with me, is often the same thing. But of course I would have known that Santa, in his heavy red suit, could never have survived the surprising heat of our recent weather.
I was sleeping off one of those sore throat-cough-sneeze bugs that are going around when I was awakened by the tap, tap, taps coming through my bedroom ceiling. Was I dreaming? Hallucinating from my cough drops?
No, I was having my roof replaced. Even still half asleep, I knew this was a good thing. Even if it was happening at 8 a.m.
Suddenly, the Drifters’ 1963 hit song, “Up on the Roof,” was playing in my head.
“When this old world starts a-getting me down, and people are just too much for me to face, I’ll climb way up to the top of the stairs and all my cares just drift right into space.”
I felt lighter just hearing it.
Rooftops have been elusive in my life, given my distaste for the elevators one usually has to take to get to them. But I once spent some daydreaming moments on the roof of my Greenwich Village walk-up apartment, back in the day, as the now popular expression goes. It was somewhat scary, but in a good way, to walk up the stairs from my third-floor apartment to the roof entrance one flight up, my hand shaking a little as I opened the door to the barren space with minimal enclosure. But the reward was waiting.
“On the roof it’s peaceful as can be / and there the world below don’t bother me…”
It was somehow very comforting watching the roofers remove the red clay tiles and clean the ones that could still be used, to be placed next to the new ones, making the structure stronger.
I’ve never been on the roof of my house, which by its design doesn’t invite visitors, but I confess to having a secret fantasy of dancing barefoot on the tiles, knowing I wouldn’t fall because this is my safe place.
Email patriciabunin@sbcglobal.net. Follow her on Patriciabunin.com