BackwaterBlog

The Demolition Man allowed as to how he could save the deck lumber, if we wanted.  “Just take a chainsaw to them posts there, lift the whole shebang up and set ‘er down in the yard over yonder.  Yep.”

Now that’s all fine and good.  Lumber’s expensive, particularly the kind of lumber that I prefer to buy.  The clear stuff that’s hard to find, purchased from the old boys in the run down mill over in P-Town.  But it presents me with a project, for as soon as he “Sets ‘er down” in the yard I’m gonna have to attack it with crowbar and sledge, nail-pullers and saw.  There’s a not so gentle art for you, making useful lumber out of an already put together thing.  And you can rest assured that I don’t put ‘em together with the idea that they’re to be taken apart.  Not in the slightest.

Curiously, the deck survived in much better fashion than the house itself.  Oh it had a fair sized hole burnt through it, right in the heart of the main fire area, but structurally it sailed right along.

When I was finished building it some 2 years ago, the county inspector came by to take a look and render his officious opinion thereto.  This being one Bubba, a waddling youth of squinted eye who had never had an original thought in his entire life, and spent his day frustrating builders hither and yon with obscure references to “The Code”.  Meaning the building code of course, which often as not was some interpretation of his own, and had nothing to do with any actual regulations produced by officials down at the state capital.

Bubba took a dislike to me for some reason, something to do with an error on the building permit, and delighted in that error with a series of suggestions for “improving” the deck.  Metal ties, increased tread overhang, another rim joist and so on.  Actually insisted on seeing the plastic tag that comes stapled to every board and quizzing me on what it meant (that being pure nirvana for me.  I can hold forth on lumber specifications for hours, knew that tag like my own name, and it’s entirely possible that he learned something that day following my lengthy sermon).

It frustrated me a little bit.  Bubba refused to sign off on the deck until his whims had been satisfied, which meant the house couldn’t be occupied, and that of course was a major problem.  “Not structurally correct according to Code”, I believe was his comment on the inspection report.

I showed that report to one of the neighbors who, of course, was following all this with huge interest.  Entertainment is hard to come by in the backwater and a feud betwixt builder and inspector is always a lively way to pass the time.  I supposed I whined more than a little bit as Tim read the report, standing out in the yard with a Marlboro in his hand and a straw hat atop his head.

“Lawd, fella.  That boy sure does make life miserable, don’t he?  Structurally incorrect?  My land, you could park a battleship on that sumbitch.”

“I ’spect you could, Tim.  But he ain’t never seen a 2 x 12 rim around a 2 x 8 joist system before and it’s not in his picture book, either.  So he’s giving me the business, I reckon.”

“Yuh.  He’s good at that, he is.  Funny, ’cause he ain’t never swung a hammer in his life, far as I know.  Got that job from his daddy, ol’ Cletus from down Weeksville way, and his daddy wasn’t much more useful than a busted shovel either.  Likes that county paycheck though, and that county Jeep he hoofs around in.  Sure does that”, and he shaded his eyes for another look at the majestic deck running across the rear of my house.

“Reckon I could call his boss and get a second opinion, Tim?”

“Spence, you mean, the old man?  Oh you could.  Hell we’ve all tried that from time to time.  Won’t do ye no good though.  Spence, he’s even worse than Bubba is, from what I’ve been able to tell.  Regular beaurocrat, that one.”

We paused, and Tim fished another cigarette from a pocket and lit up.  “Tell ye what to do next time, though”, he offered.

“What’s that?”

“Why, just build a set ‘o steps up to the door.  Tack a handrail on there and call it good.  Then after he passes it, tear the sumbitch down and get to work on the real thing.  Soon as he’s off the property, I mean.  He ain’t gonna be comin’ back, right?  And ain’t nobody from the county makin’ a special trip way out here, anyhoo.”

I laughed.  “That’s the way it’s done, eh?”

“Sure ’nuff.  ‘Course, it’s bit late for that now.  Shame.  Why, you could park a battleship . . .”

And so it went, and eventually Bubba won his victory.  I scurried and sweated and performed all the little tasks he desired, until he was tired of the game and reluctantly signed off on the house.  A few weeks later he chuckled to a lad down the street about how he “Ran that new fella ragged with his big deck”, and I saw the true nature of his Bubba ways, and the feud didn’t die.

Now I never anticipated having to rebuild much of anything on the homestead, so Tims advice about sidestepping the building department just kinda laid there in the back of my mind.

Of course, it popped back up very quickly when the insurance man and I talked a few days ago.  “Huh.  Got a lotta deck there, bud.  Way more than the new builder’s gonna have in his bid, so I’m gonna have to get you to do it, and we’ll compensate you for the time and materials of course, and . . .”

I had to stifle a groan, when talking with the insurance man.  Not sure he’d understand it all, and it didn’t much matter, any road.  Didn’t keep me from ranting about it to Ally, of course, but she’s used to such things, and listened impassively as I muttered dark and evil things concerning fat inspectors and something about settling this feud thing, Backwater style.  I got the feeling she was pretty much unimpressed with the seriousness of it all.

But not me.  Bubba done questioned my quality of work, the fat little creep.

And the feud?  Oh my.  Just gettin’ warmed up, you betcha. 

~I’d say that I really hate hotels, but we checked out of the one we were staying in and managed to leave the power cord for the laptop in the room.  So I’ll be saying nice things about them until I get it back.  Karma and all that, you know.

~We’re lodged in a rental house that was last massaged by a carpenters hands sometime before the boys landed in Normandy.  And it’s urban.  Middle of the city.  There’s creaks and knocks and the neighborhood isn’t very secure.  As in - the Ruger strays not so far from my hand - secure.  On the plus side, Ally can walk across the street to go to work.  and the dogs have a veritable football field to romp in, just out the back door.

~No email at the moment.  Changing addresses for an existing account does that, I guess.  Hint to my kids - leave comments here or call, okay?

~The lads working in the shop for my employer, the ones who produce the goodies that I spend my day installing, took up a collection for us.  $67, and most of it in one dollar bills.  I have to say, that one moved me closer to tears than anything.  Most of these guys are minimum wage and struggling.  Working in a sweatbox for 10 hours a day in June heat.  Just . . . damn.

~I took a detour on my way to the jobsite yesterday so I could see a bit of countryside.  It wasn’t the backwater by any means, more of a gentrified slice of brick homes set out in a nice way and nestled back among manicured pines and “rustic” barns.  But it was something, a little something.  A little piece of the woods.

~They’ll be pulling up to the husk of my (real) house with a D-8 shortly, and put big ruts in the lawn while the diesel engine powers a large blade through my living room.  I might go down and watch the show but I don’t think Ally wants any part of that.

~Today we go sign some papers which will set in motion the building of a new house.  There was a moment when we viewed the model house, something about the large bathtub, and Ally broke and there were tears.  I guess I saw it too, giving the grandson a bath so many nights, and the giggles and the splashing, the shimmying of a small boy set in water.  And later, wrapped in a towel and warm.  The contentment of such things, my word . . . and what my good wife sees in a bathroom, in a model house.

~I dug Ally’s earrings out of a pile of filthy insulation the other day and remembered.  It was the two of us out on the town . . . what, twenty years ago?  Kids at the sitters, she and I strolling a waterfront on a brisk fall evening and there was a jewelry store set in there somewhere, and just an impulse.  Dropping something north of a paycheck on a simple set of opals, and Ally protesting in that way women have, a smile and a frown all at the same time.  But the look boy, the look.  The dancing in the eyes, and the crook of a finger, and I was as lost as I was the first time I saw her.  Little baubles and large dreams, they are.

~Battery’s getting low.  Mustn’t let the precious go completely dead, here.  We survive.

~Finding hotels that allow dogs to stay, legally or with that sort of wink and a nod thing, is a task best reserved for treasure hunters. Knobby kneed old timers in bermuda shorts and black socks, waving an instrument over a sandy beach.

~Finding one with internet access beyond that of a tin can and a bit of string? Oh please.

~Owning but two pair of pants and a sack of T-shirts is strangely liberating. ‘Cause they’re new! And new work boots, too!

~My wife, on the other hand, has filled the hotel clothes rack and is searching for more hangers. Those dresser drawers are filling up as well.

~Telling a tale to 3 people at the Watering Hole will result in an entire city dialing your phone. I tell ye, it’s just like the internet.

~My pal Pam at the Sixweasels site (over there, to the lefty side) wrote a thing yesterday and it was . . . darlin’ I have no words. And I’m sorry about your mascara, but the tears lubricated your typing fingers just beautifully.

~The prayers and notes left by good people mean everything to us. Thank you so much.

~Sifting through a burn out house is like playing in a bag of charcoal briquettes.

~Come tomorrow, we’ll get to inventory everything in the house. Ally sez her diamond earrings were on the nightstand, in a glass dish, where they always were. It’s about a foot deep in wet ceiling insulation and drywall right now. Boy, that might take some time.

More to come. Sincere thanks to all of you.

I don’t know where I got it from.  Probably a genetic thing, gifted from farming grandfathers who heeded lowing bovines to rise from their slumbers on any given day.  But I’ve always been one who spent the best hours of the day before 6.  That’s 6 am.  As in pre-sunrise, with no demands save for a coffeepot and a sleeping dog stretched at my feet.

Yesterday was a 3 am sort of morning.  Stillness in the backwater, a flash of heat lightning from the front window as I sat in reclined surf mode, the laptop carrying me hither and yon as it often does.  The stories, the ranting.  Checking the local weather radar.  “Hmmm. . . big slice of rain blowing in.  Need it.  Ought to be here any time now.”

And indeed, the lightning turned frequent, and a trickle of rain became a heavy downpour and the light show was spotlighting the front yard beautifully for me, long seconds at a time.  “Good rain, be cutting grass this weekend for sure, now.”

There came a pittering sound, a sputtering from somewhere in the kitchen, and the big Laborador shifted with a grunt in his sleep, even as I shifted in my chair and silently blessed my sleeping wife.  “Made the coffee last night, just kicked on out there.  Nice of her”, because she does not always do this for me.

Dark, and quiet.  The glow of a laptop and a single table lamp.

For whatever reason, and I guess I’ll be forever wondering, I happened to look at the cable modem which all of a sudden had gone dark.  A bugger it is, to live in storm country where modems go dark and the morning internet is stilled.  I heaved up out of the chair and stumbled to the kitchen, the sputtering sound, and flicked the light switch.  Nothing.  Still had a table lamp on, but no overhead.  Huh?

And the laundry room.

Filling with smoke.

There’s minutes that turn your brain to absolute mush.  I yanked to back door open to find flames curling up the outside wall of the house and my feet were flying toward the hose - the HOSE! - hanging in blackness at the other end of the house.  Drag the hose, hit the nozzle and . . . nothing.

“No pressure . . . Jesus the well pump’s out too!”

There was thumping feet and slick wood deck and a battle cry coming from my very soul out there in the dark, and an eerie glow from the ventilated soffit that finally tripped my carpenter brain - fire in the roof trusses!  Move goddam it!

The sputtering sound.  Racing into the bedroom where my wife lay dreaming, and the hellish noise of a bass voice gone tenor on me, and a look to the dogs, and Ally coming up flying and grabbing for clothes.

A very long moment with a flashilight that appeared in my hand, and breaking it on the foot of the laptop table as I yanked cords and pushed wife and Lab to the front door, and raced down the driveway to the rig and Ally to her car, and throwing stuff in the rig, and back to the house for, what?  What to save, what to gather?  Ally blowing her horn and screaming “Get out Jim, get out!”

But for a small dog, almost forgotten, cowering by the coffee table, and unmoving in fear, and me scooping him up and getting out, Jim.  Getting the hell out.  To move cars to the yard next door.  911ing the hell out of cell phones that were somehow in pockets.

And standing, in rain, to watch the backwater burn.

There’s a slowness about it all.  Hearing fire trucks race across roads miles from you, and know that they are lost trying to find this little place, and seeing the roof slowly succomb to flames, and a wife in tears seeing a horror.  There’s a slowness to backwater living even as there’s a slowness to its dieing.

I sit here in this little motel room, with the two dogs and Ally, and the smoke is still thick on my clothes from yesterday.  Likely ruined, so far as clothes go.  But I might wear them today, trudging through the sodden mess that 30 firemen make when going about their business.  A business that wafts great sheets of spray on dreams afire, and you see it in their eyes, and they look at you and grip a shoulder for a moment, and you know sorrow.

Yet we live, and haven’t made any promise beyond the next hour or day.  The dogs look at me and remember the shouting and feel as if they’ve done something wrong, and I soothe them and say “It’s all fine boys”, and they aren’t convinced.

I tried to tell Ally not to go with me this morning, to meet the insurance man, and sift through that rubble, but she is Ally.  She looked at me.  The very deep part of her looked at me and murmured, “I’m going.”

And she will.  Because it is ever and always her and I.

God willing, it always will be.

On a completely unrelated note, blogging may be light for a while.

That’s a joke son. . .

When we went out a few weeks ago and plucked a gangly dog from a place that rescues dogs as a matter of course, I had no idea.

Really, no idea at all.  See, I’ve nearly always been around dogs of the muttly sort.  A little bit cross bred.  A splash of white on the chest of a large black dog, a slightly pointed snout on what otherwise might be called a Lab.  Oh they were all fine in their own way, relatively obedient souls with little in the way of independent thought.

Maggie and her clown Boxer dog, of pure lineage and perfect markings marked an insight into the world of having a thoroughbred around, one with brains and the oft-heard comment that “He’s too smart for his own good”, or something more profane when he thoughtfully chewed slippers after being left in confinement for longer than he liked.

But this dog here.  This Laborador called Sam.

I drive the Backwater with a large Lab, front feet planted atop the small cooler to my right and a steady gaze ahead.  When the drive turns longish, as it always does, he whirls and stretches long for a nap on the floor, the tunnel between two rows of large tools that run the length of a ten foot long box attached to a very dirty van chassis.  I spend hours in the Shop, with the door rolled high and Sam on a long lead patrolling the yard.  But always he is near and he steps into the truck and looks to me.  “I’m ready, we’re going aren’t we?  I’ll work for you, come along with you, but ever and always I want to BE with you, tall man in bib overalls.  I want to lay before tall fires on cool evenings and stare with half open eyes at this life, and know that you are in the room without looking.  I want the thrill of you letting me off this lead so that I can race across the half-acre and show you that your trust is warranted, that I’ll come back in a trice at a word.  To shove a block shaped head under your arm and hold it there to feel the closeness and warmth, and stare.  Soaking up every motion of the hands, hearing every inflection of the voice that compels.”

I’ve not been around this level of ability in a dog.  The notion that one of his catagory was found wandering in the woods is astonishing.  He travels with me, and is let out on leash to parade before people who invariably exclaim, “He’s gorgeous!  My god, what a beautiful boy!”, and his master is proud and not a little silly with that pride.

He is an alpha, and is creating his role every day.

Now in the manner that such a life cannot help but be tinkered with, enter my Eldest Daughter, the lover of all-things-dog.  She called me the other evening as I drove from city to woods, a hand on the silky black head beside me, his huge feet webbed and steady on the cooler.

“Daddy, promise me you won’t be mad at me . . .”

“Huh?  What kind of way is that to start a conversation?”

“Well, cause . . . Mom’s bringing something home with her.”

“My dinner?”

“Uh . . . no.”

“Hmmm.  Cash money?”

“No.  Promise you won’t be . . .”

“What is it, for heavens sake?”

“Well I was down in Carolina today and there was this dog, see, and . . .”  She was suddenly in a rush to explain, and I know this girl grown to be a woman, know her well.  And she spun the story and my mind drifted as it always does, for I might live in 2008 but the mind is always and forever drifting to times when she was six, or ten or sixteen, and I feel and smell the day when a little smaller but equally determined Beth was gunning to talk the old man into something, and it makes me smile of a moment.  She might live apart now, in a place not too far away, but I still tangle blonde hair in my calloused paw and draw her near and buss her forehead to me, the little lass with a tale to tell.

“. . . and I took the dog up to Mom’s work and she kinda looked at me funny, and . . .”

The tractors, in the field and me flying by with a grinning Lab, eyes dancing at life springing black from soil turned over, soon for the seed, and a cloud of dust in the rearview.  The tinkling sound of a collar with tags as a head swivels to follow every movement.

“. . . but I couldn’t just leave him there, right?  I mean he was helpless, he was . . .”

And Beth was relentless, and I watched miles ticking by as she talked in my ear and Sam panted happy next to me.  She allowed that Mom would explain it all to me, and Mom generally does, although it’s not an explanation at all but a curious mix of “Here it all is Honey, and did Beth call you?”, which sort of blends into a “You already know about this of course” and leaves me flummoxed as to what to do with the wimmen in my life.  Again.

The alpha, being what he is, probably took it with a lot more aplomb than his master did.  It is another role for him.

I have no doubt he will play it well.

But for gosh sakes.

Three weeks ago we had no dog at all!

When we first moved down to the woods and the house and land were being assembled, the issue of a driveway reared its head.  The builder/realtor had included the makings of a concrete driveway in the price.  “Yup, run you a nice driveway from the road to the house”, he said.

The backwater being what it is, it so happened that he put it off until the very end of the project when the monsoon season was gettin’ up.  Rained for days it did, and concrete and rain do not make happy driveways at all.

It had the unfortunate consequence of stalling the closing on the house.  Couldn’t close the loan without a driveway, and moving trucks would sink to their axles in the bog of Carolina clay in any case.

I finally called the guy.  “Look, let’s just do a gravel drive.  Screw the concrete, get me forty yards of crusher-run out here and spread it out so we can get this thing done, okay?”

The realtor was delighted.  I just saved him large money, see?  He jumped all over it and the deed was done the very next day.  House closed, problem solved.

Well, sorta.

In the way of doing things down here, I had a guy out to spread more gravel just weeks after moving in.  Make it bigger and longer, you see.  That driveway became a living thing.  Something to be nurtured and tended much like a garden.  It helped not at all that I put up a 40 foot shop in the backyard and the last 30 feet of driveway leading up to it was . . . sand.

Truck eating, soft and maleable sand.  After six months, the sand turned to mud and I had my own mud bog for a parking spot.  And as attractive as that might sound for a house in the swamp I was getting fearful that one night the big rig might sink out of sight and never be seen again.

This is what 20 yards of crusher-run looks like after a rookie driveway maker (that would be me) spends 3 hours on it.  With a tractor and rear mounted blade.  Shovel, rake.  And more than a few longnecks.  I took this photo while standing on the concrete apron of the shop.

Another few hours and the deed was done.  Flat, serviceable parking had once again been established.

One of the neighbors happened by, a tough worker of the land who always takes an interest in the improvements of homes in the neighborhood.  “Looks nice son, right good job ye done there.  Graded it all by eye, did ye?” and yes, I had.

He squinted, coughed.  “Kinda glad y’all went with t’ gravel.  I was thinkin’ when you moved in y’all might be pourin’ concrete for a drive.  We all was.  Gravel just works better ’round here.”

It might have been unspoken, but the implication was clear.  Concrete was for rich folks.  Crusher-run and tractors were in order, down here.

Shucks, I’m glad.  I’d hate to be thought of as the snob with the concrete driveway.

That just wouldn’t do at all.  Naw, not at all.

My wife and I are dog people. In nearly 28 years of wedded bliss (insert cackling laughter) we’ve had a dog for all but the first 2. Newlywed apartments being what they are, we had to settle for a cat during those times.

Picked up a Lab/mix in ‘83 who spent the next eleven years with us and witnessed the birth of our three children.

Picked up another Lab/mix in ‘94. Seems like he was a yearling at the time. This one passed just a few weeks ago, having lived for at least 15 years. That’s old for a Lab.

Along the way there’s been the occasional attempt at having more than one dog, or a guest dog would show up for a spell. Cats would wander in, or a lizard or hamster. When you have children and a home and a wife who can’t say no the menagerie promises to be in a state of flux at odd given moments.

But always, there was the prime dog. Given the not-so-difficult task of anchoring the home and making it his own. Growling at intruders to give me a little warning, a little head start to the Remington. The keeper of the space, a presence for the woman when I’m off down the road on some dusty jobsite for days on end. An entertainer. A lounging sloth in the workshop to serve as a sounding board, a keen observer of kitchen activities.

We keep a dog because it’s the way things are, and have always been.

People in the Backwater understand this. Rare indeed is the house down here without one, or several. They roam at large because fencing is expensive and limiting, and a dog content with his lot won’t go very far anyway.

Ally and I made the trip yesterday to a rescue shelter. It’s a strange way to add to your family, to roll dice and hope for the look, a spark, when seeing all sorts of dogs cramped behind steel and shouldering each other for a look at strangers in khaki and boots, the kennel deafening with the howl and bark of dogs in trouble. A dozen such dogs, sent to the very back edge of a backwater swamp, to a building hard to find and out of the way.

I believe in a lot of the undercurrent things that go on between dogs and the humans who attempt to herd them. Who attempt to know what’s best for them. I looked at one who huddled, shivering in his pen on a hard concrete floor. He was much older, a silvery mix of breeds and obviously new from a home of some kind, a soul accustomed to carpet and regular meals and a soft hand. He had the stare of the defeated, and the thought went through me that no, this one wouldn’t work for what we are. And he turned and slumped to a corner and would look no more. He knew, and I knew. And a hard old thing it is to know.

Just as simple or hard to reject the jumper, the loud one, the downright ugly one. I followed in Ally’s wake and she was being very slow about the whole thing. Would have taken just about all of them I’m sure. But there was one, yes, and he spoke without sound and for a wonder, he was a Lab. He tracked us with his eyes, just a couple of barks, trying to peer around the corner of the pen when we walked away. I saw all this because I was tracking him as well, and his alertness. Like I say, I believe in that sort of stuff. Just like I believe in the spark between man and wife who speak without words, and it was no surprise to me when Ally said, “Can we see that one please, the Lab?”

It was a start, the start of the first day for a dog we’ll call Sam.

There was the skittish nervousness of a juvenile Black Lab, all big feet and muscle and tail going in four directions at once. He was thin, bony even, from some never to be explained wandering before the Shelter got hold of him. Skinny or not, he pulled me to the car like a crazed mule, a rope lead digging into my hands. “Good lord”, I said to Ally. “There’s nothing wrong with his energy!” And he hauled me to the nearest big pine tree and pooped like he’d been holding it for a week.

“Good dog! Good Sam!” He was, well, like someone just released from jail, and I worried about his past, my stinging hands and the cars upholstery.

But he glided into the backseat and calmly sat upright as if he did it every day.

We stopped at the grocery and laid in food. And a proper leash. And a long training lead. And because we are foolish spoilers of grandsons and dogs, a rawhide bone.

Ally was all set to walk him when we got home, and he demonstrated no lack of a sense of equality as he dragged her around the acreage on a jailbreak flight.

But once in the house, he was mannerly and obedient. He watched my wife, he followed her, he wouldn’t let either of us out of sight.

There was an agreement made, and the proper signs were exchanged.

Right now, he sleeps and dreams on the floor alongside the bed of his mistress. There is a look about him, from his eyes, and it isn’t the look of eagles just yet. It’s a look of wanting, of course, always a dog is wanting a touch, a meal. This is a look of wanting to be part of something. He wants to join the club and we’re just as wanting that he do so.

It’s the way things ought to be. Welcome, Sam.

Not having seen him since January, the little man lingers in a shadow of me, a loved and soothing shadow.  I go there at times, to feel better of my life and how it is lived.  And to pray the prayer of one who doesn’t deserve the priviledge of prayer.

God, keep him safe for one more night.  Keep the furies at bay.

I had the DeWalt chopper set up in the back hallway of some random cubicle farm, zapping up chunks of backsplash and other useful sticks of what passes for building material in this day and age.  It was a pleasant jobsite.  There was a low hum of activity, 20 trade mechanics moving in an efficient way to bring a new office to life.  It’s always struck me as a strange thing, that low hum.  You’d think more noise on a construction site would equal more stuff getting done.  No, the good ones are quiet, because they are filled with goodly experienced lads who don’t need to ask or inquire, and go about their business with no wasted motion, and expect much the same from you.  It’s a delicate dance we do, out here.

The plumber was around the corner and in the Men’s while I sprayed sawdust from the back of the rapid firing saw.  Bandy little guy with goggles and clutching a propane torch.  He emerged a trifle agitated, calling  ”Lighter?  Anybody got a lighter?” to the otherwise empty hall.

I fished the Zippo out of the shirt pocket and waved, clinking it open with my left while never releasing the saw trigger in my right, and he pounced at it.  The steady yellow flame fed his wavering blue one, until he dialed in the  dosage and a thin blue heat hissed like a laser between us.  He jammed a cigarette to his lips, waved the torch past it in a smooth arc (oh the little skills we pick up out here) and gave me a nod and a wink, off to the shitter to melt some copper into compliance with local codes.

“Hey Plumber, got your sinks here?  I got countertops, they need holes, you got sinks?”  It’s a standard thing with me, I ask this on every job. 

Carpenters install lots of cabinets, cabinets that frequently house sinks.  You’d think that the Plumber would be responsible for cutting his own sink hole through the top, but no.  One day long ago, stone aged Plumber forgot his jigsaw one day, and the superintendent was impatient to get the kitchen finished on his tenant build-out and was berating the Plumber for being so careless as to forget his saw.  So the Plumber, being a crafty and shifty sort, said “Look, there’s a Carpenter over there.  I just know he has a jig, get his ass to do it!”  And the super pondered for a minute and remarked “Gee, there’s a thought!”  So he went to the Carp, pulled out a twenty, had a quiet word and in minutes, the job was done.

Problem is, long ago Carpenter did such a nice job of it, with his sleek jigsaw with sharp blades that Plumbers began to spread the word.  Leave the saw at home they whispered in their dark plumber filled watering holes.  Leave it at home and get the Carpenter to do it.  Why, he does such a better job of it than we can.  Besides, why should we have to take a chance butchering somebody else’s product?  The Plumbers got drunk and indignant, and changed the industry forever in their twisted and evil way.

You don’t think so?  It’s all true, my friends.  Every word.

Turns out there were 2 plumbers on the job, and they were there to install sinks.  Just sinks.  They had nothing else left.  I was ahead of them by a little bit, but 2 plumbers with little to do gained ground on me in a hurry, the lone installer of things wood.  By the time they caught me, I was on the last two bathrooms and they were positively dawdling.  Noticably.

“Sheesh.  Looks like a dime’s holding up a dollar, eh?” as I glanced behind me while simultaneously firing three screws into a base cabinet.  They chuckled, admiring a brass fitting and wiping rags over the next sink with a polish.  “You just keep gettin’ up there, Woodpecker.  We got all afternoon.”

I pulled the next cabinet into alignment, whisked a clamp from the toolbelt, nudged the toebase with a prybar and slipped a shim in, checked the level and fisted the clamp tight.  Three screws, next, repeat.

“Right efficient there, ain’t he Bob?  Moves like he mighta done this oncet or twicet.  Where’s your help today, Carp?”

I grinned.  “Who needs help when I got you two climbin’ right up my ass?  Y’all got me motivated.”

Cabinets screwed to wall.  Top screwed to cabinets.  Four rapid moves and the sink lines were drawn.  Tip the jigsaw, plunge cut the first line (”Hey Smitty, he didn’t even drill a hole!  Didja see that?”).  Round the fourth corner with the saw, switched to left hand for the last 3 inches so the right hand could snake under the top to catch the chunk of top about to drop onto their shiny water lines and drain fitting.  Saw stops, chunk of top whirls through the air like a frisbee and lands atop 6 others just like it.  Done, and done.

“There y’are, lads.  You’re up to bat”, and saws and drills and toolbelts begin to nest themselves onto the big rolling cart I use.  The plumbers were impressed.

“Fine work there, Mr. Carpenter.  Just glad it weren’t me that had to do it.  Hate those sink cuts, I do.”

I paused, for the sheer drama of it all, pulling sunglasses over eyes and strolling for the door.  “Shucks, I kinda like ‘em, really.”

The Plumber raised eyebrows.  “Ye do?  How’s that?”

“Simple.  Means I’m done, and you ain’t.  Ta, boys.”

Woodpeckers.  Faster to the watering hole, and make better lovers, and all that.  Couldn’t imagine it any other way.

The stars are aligned.  The schedules tweaked.  The daughter and grandson are coming home for a few days.  A precious few hours.

 There’s a catch to it, of course.  Children are an endless string of catches, and knots, and fuzzy shredded ends of string.  Even adult children.  Who have borne children of their own into your midst.

The catch is I have to go fetch her.  From PA, no less.  Which is a fairish sort of drive when you’re living in the backwater.  Load ‘em up and drive back south.  And when the visit is over, Ally gets to reverse the procedure (because I am fair about sharing the load, don’t you see) and drop them off.

This will be the second time this has been done.  Last time I drove the return leg.  At night.  Very late at night, in fact.  There was a blur of interstate 95 at 3 am with no coffee that just about did me in, because I am not so muchly a night-owl and treasure things like a large bed, particularly at 3 am.

But it shall be done.  I’ll roll up 95 through DC and that other burg to the east (Pam and Batt!  695 and 795 at midnight, send up a flare!), then on up some pike to the little town on the PA border where pretzels are made.

For them.

He will be bigger and she wiser.  There will be a grandma at the end of a 12 hour driving day with a house so clean, and a tree stuffed with belated Christmas things.

There will be pictures.  New Years pictures for a new year with a little old man and the momma who loves him.  There is a rightness about such things.