“You can sit by me if you like….”

“You can sit by me if you like,” Jarret said to me at lunch today

“Do you know why I asked you to sit by me?”, he asked.

“No, Why do you ask me to sit by you?” I replied.

“Because I like you! “he said with a shy smile.

Jarret is 4 years old.

He has been asking me to sit by him now for the past three weeks.

Our crew is building a shop at their farm.

The family  has  invited us in for  lunch  almost every day we’ve been on the job.

When I sit down at their  14 ft farm table  I think,...this is what it must have felt like to be a part of a large threshing crew..

Grant Wood’s Dinner For Threshers

People with a real gift of hospitality are a dying breed.

Even here in Iowa.

It’s one thing to invite a few close friends over for  lunch once in a while..

I scratch your back, you scratch mine..right?

Well, …it’s a completely different ball game to cook lunch for  a construction crew of 4 , 5 days a week, for the better part of a month.

Today lasagna  was on the menu

Yesterday I thought  Jarret’s mom had asked if I wanted a piece of “cheese cake” for desert?
“Yummy I said..I love cheese cake…!

“No” she replied, I said  “sheet cake”

my bad.

Well, today, guess what we had for desert?

Cheese cake topped with a blueberry filling.

I had to pry the guys away from the table today….

They did not want to go back to work.

John said it was the best tasting lasagna he’d ever had.

While I’m thinking about it..here’s a recent crew photo

Crew photo

I work with a great bunch of guys.

The morale on this crew is second to none.

Nothing worse than working around someone with a bad attitude.

At this point in my life, when I’m looking to hire someone, the numero uno thing I am looking for is

ATTITUDE.

I don’t care if you don’t know how to properly hold a hammer or read a tape measure.

I can teach you those things.

What I really detest is a whiner or someone with a dark cloud following them around.

I am really enjoying  the guys   that is helping me out this Winter.

As I write this, I feel like I’m starting to fade….4:30 AM comes pretty early

Jarret’s comments were still rolling around in my head when I got home from work, and I wanted to tell you about it…

Yea, I’m assuming I have a couple of regular readers 

There is just something serendipitous about a 4 year old   requesting that I be his lunch buddy 3 weeks in a row.

I am a rich man.

I will miss Jarret when the job is done…

Heck, I will miss the whole family…

Here is a picture of the shop we’ve been working on:

End view of shop

One last thing before I sign off…

Did you know what the word Hospitality literally means?

Hospitality:  Lover of strangers

I believe it is more caught than taught…

Jarret is growing up in a home where it is being modeled in a powerful way….

If I were a betting man, someday when he has a home of his own, he will also know how it’s done….

Is there anyone in your life, with the gift of hospitality?  Tell me about them.

Grandma was wrong

Picture of me at work yesterday….20 feet in the air/ living the dream ….my dream that is;-)

________________________________________________________

“Oh Doug.. You were such a good student…I really hoped you would go to college.”  grandma said when she found out her eldest grandson was NOT planning to go to college..instead, I had decided to follow in my dad’s foot steps and work in construction.

There was disappointment written all over her face..

I felt bad.  Not until she was dead and gone did I appreciate where she was coming from.  Not until I had children of my own, watched them make life choices  that would affect them  long term… in ways they didn’t understand…then I was finally able to understand my grandma’s concerns…

But Grandma was wrong.

There is more to life than money.  A meaningful life  has nothing to do with material things…

I have a couple of friends who are making 2 and 3 times the amount of money  I do but hate their jobs….

They have full benefits, a 401 K… and they are quick to talk about what they want to do when they retire.

No thank you.

Quoting my dad now...”The word retirement is not in my vocabulary”

(Dad just turned 80 this past year and is still active in construction)

Last week I stopped @ Loes to buy a new  skill saw.

Good morning”  I said to a woman about my age.   She looked tired.

“How are you?” I asked…”(It was about 7 AM..she was  checking inventory)

“I wish I were home” she  replied.

I felt for her..  Her life was not her own.  There were bills to pay…only God knows the series of life decisions and circumstances that have brought her to this place in life….

Last April I was invited to speak at a jobs fair for high school students.

Started by sharing a quote that has cast a long shadow over my life :

“Do what you love and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

Don’t just settle for a job where you punch the time clock.

You may have to work @ a job  (or three) where you  “punch the time clock” in order to get where you really want to be….

but don’t stop there.. God didn’t create you to be a mindless worker ant ..unless that is what you really love to do.

I remember the pressure I felt  in school trying to figure out what I wanted to do once I graduated.   A real part of me thought I should  be a vet…that was until Mr Guard pulled me to the side one day in the guidance office  and  “suggested ” my grades indicated I probably couldn’t handle vet school.  I know he was only doing his job..but “dream killer” comes to mind  when I think of that conversation.

(years later I built a house for a vet/ told her my story, to which she replied, “Doug, if you really wanted to be a vet,one way or the other, you could have done it.  I didn’t make it the first time or two when I applied to vet school either..if you want it bad enough, you could have done it”)

Two  of my daughters , have  the desire to be a wives  and mothers.

Period.

I remember being @ the ripe old age of 20, having the strongest desire (nesting urge?) to settle down and start a family.

So  I did.

Best decision I ever made.

Pop culture today  mock those kind of  dreams…and I’m here to tell you, pop culture is full of #@$%%.

(that’s  German for incorrect…I’ve been using more German in my blog posts lately  you may have noticed )

If truth be told, pop culture is wrong on just about everything it promotes.
“We’ve  got a form of brainwashing going on in our country.”  Morrie sighed.  “Do you know how they brainwash people?  They repeat something over and over.And that’s what we do in this country.  Owning things is good.  More money is good.  More property is good.  More commercialism  is good.  More is good.  More is good. We repeat it – and have it repeated to us – over and over until nobody bothers to even think otherwise.  The average person is so fogged up by all this, he has no perspective on what’s really important anymore….

from the book Tuesday’s with Morrie.

_______________________________

If there is more to life than money…what do you think that “more” is?

What in your life brings you satisfaction?

What would you tell the person who is up to their eyeballs in bills, who feels stuck in a dead in job they hate?

DM

It’s that time of year again…

You could hear them coming.

Geese.

It was a crisp Fall morning, The leaves were turning ,  Dean and I  were putting sheeting on a  12/12 pitch roof of  a  $750,000.00 house.

A Kodak moment.

We watched  as the formation flew over us, low enough to throw a rock at…

plop,plop, plop…

goose dung on his shoulder and hat.

Now  it was really a Kodak moment.

Ever since, whenever geese are heading our way, I will  say to whomever is with me…“Hurry, they’re coming!  Look up,  you might get some “geese candy”.    It hasn’t happened since, but I’m always hoping.

Several years ago this same Dean and I were trying to put felt paper on a new roof in the dead of Winter.

The wind was howling,  wind chill was below zero.

it was crazy we were even on a roof.

Finally,  we decided to head for the basement and warm up.

There was an unventilated LP heater hooked up.   It  felt SO GOOD.

1/2 hour later,  we went back on the roof to finish.  The two of us  started giggling like a couple of little girls, the tears were running down our faces.

We decided that we must have been “gassed.” ;-0

Everything was funny.

We could barely hold on to the roll of paper w/o the wind ripping it our of our hands.  The extreme cold. The fact we’d just about been gassed. Everything.

My wife read to me a proverb the other day that said  ”A cheerful heart has a continual feast”  

She said it reminded her of me.

I have a “help wanted” add in the paper this week…. Here’s  what a “DM” “help wanted add looks like:

 Help wanted.  Could turn into full-time.  General construction.  Prefer someone with NO experience.  Must be able to read tape measure, climb, have valid driver’s license and GOOD ATTITUDE.

If I’m going to spend  8 hours of  my day with you, the last thing I want  is  to work with someone who has a dark cloud overhead.  If you think you fit the qualifications, drop me a note.  I have been known to hire women in the past.

 

Enough for now, time to set some cement forms.   Thank for reading along!  DM

___________________________

I originally posted this in 2007.  I was rooting around in the archives this afternoon…there are over 400 posts there..figured some of my newer readers may have never read this one before so I decided to do a little editing and re-post it.  I really may be looking for some help btw..won’t be running an ad in the paper but it looks like I have quite a bit of work coming in the next couple of months..so, if you’re feeling the urge to work in construction…don’t hesitate to ask…you don’t know if you don’t ask DM

knowing when to get angry

“You have to learn what’s worth getting angry about.”  Lester said to me  in his gentle way.

I was 16 years old, had just unleashed a string of profanities.

That conversation took place almost 40 years ago and  I can STILL remember it to this day.

I remember thinking, “You know, he’s right.  Nobody pays too much attention to me now when I get mad.  That can’t be good.”

Les  reminded me of Ben Franklin….

retired farmer,

bib overhauls,

in his 60′s.

Here’s an early crew photo…Lester is in the middle and I’m to his right:

Work crew from back in the day.  We had just finished pouring a basement wall.

And yes, that was a can of Old Mill in my hand.

________________________________________

These days, it does take a lot more to light the fire.

The fuse got lit on Tuesday.

I’m temporarily working with another construction company…

My work load had slowed up, and this crew needed some extra help.

Win win

Tuesday night  on the way home, my cell phone rang..it was the owner of the construction company…He’d just got off the phone with the customer of the job I’ve been at the past month.    It was implied we were taking too long to finish the project and we needed to start putting in 10 hour days.

You’ll have to take my word on this one, but I have been busting my chops the past 5 weeks  with a crew of 2 (just myself and a helper)

The week previous I  picked up some  little clues the boss thought we must surely be about done, he had sent Dave to round up the screw guns, and extension chords .  I could see we had at least another 2 to 3 weeks, assuming there were no more change orders.  To compound my frustration, the boss has not personally set foot on the job site for two weeks,…. he personally hates detail work   (which is what we have left to finish)…

Fast forward to this phone call….

After I hung up, Jack, who was riding in the truck with me and  who had heard my side of the conversation asked what that was all about?

I repeated what I’d been told.   He reacted with “That is bull@#$%”   (which is German for that is not fair)

We both felt unappreciated and misjudged.

I could feel the anger start to build.  Rather than just stuff it, I wrote a punch list (things yet to do) when I got home.

The next morning I was @ the shop 30 minutes early, with the intention of talking to the boss one on one.

When  I got there,  the crew was already starting to trickle in. I asked to talk  with the boss in the office.   He said he didn’t  think it was necessary so I gave him the punch list in front of the assembled.    I told him  someone else could finish those items because I had my hands full,  framing walls and installing glass board.

He told me I was over-responding, and made light of my frustration.

(this is in front of others mind you)

I told someone later the mind games and passive – aggressive behavior in the midst of conflict no longer works on me quite like they once did.

Anger in and of itself is not always a bad thing…..it all depends on what you do with it.

Anger reminds me of rocket fuel.

If you’re not careful, it can  ignite, blow up and you’ll have a bigger problem.

Anger can be a wonderful  motivator for change and conflict resolution.

Thoughts, comments, questions?

18 hours

 

I had something happen this past Friday that was a first…before I tell you what happened, a little background:

I got a two month remodeling  job this Spring on a handshake.  (I’m a building contractor)

When   Mark asked me if I’d be interested in the project,  he  didn’t even ask me my hourly rate.

Just told me I had the job if I wanted it.

I’ve never worked for him before, but my brother and Uncle have.

As I was putting together my  bill last Friday,  I realized I had made a simple mathematical mistake two weeks previous  and short changed myself over 18 man hours.

As I pondered my options, my first thought was, I am going to have to tell him what happened.
It was the end of the day and the home owners son stopped by  the job site with a blank check. I had quickly totaled up our hours  for the past 3 weeks, plus some extra material expenses.  I made two copies of the invoice and hadn’t given it another thought…now here I was 2 weeks later, realizing my mistake.

I tried to put myself in his shoes….he had paid me my first check/ no questions asked….

Now if I had hired someone by the hour  and 2 weeks later he came up to me with his next bill,  told me  .I owed him an additional  18 man hours  from the previous billing cycle  because he had made a mathematical mistake,

I would pay him, but it would have leave a bad taste in my mouth.

Now I know there are plenty of people out there who wouldn’t think twice about demanding the additional money, even though it was their mistake.

In the end, I decided to chalk this up to the school of hard knocks and not tell the home- owner.

If you were in my shoes what would you have done?]

Now think about it from the customer’s perspective…

The exciting thing for me in all of this, I am not beating myself up.

This isn’t the first time  I have said or done something that ends up costing me hundreds of dollars….

I told my son John on Saturday, I choose to look at it like I just paid some  tuition for a summer class in college.

Any suggestions on the name of the class?

pouring a floor

Thanks for leaving a comment if you’re so inclined.   DM

You owe me money

Brother and myself pouring a basement wall

Two people warned me you were a tight @#% when they heard I had agreed to do some work for you.

I thought to myself…It won’t be a problem because while I didn’t know you all that well, I knew you professed to be a Christian, so, as long as I made sure I put everything  in writing, and did my normally good job of communicating, there won’t be a problem.

And here I sit, 6 weeks after the fact -  I sent you a second invoice this week and have yet to be paid.

I have pretty much decided unless something really drastic changes I am not going to do any additional work for you.  At this point, I’m out $300 in wages and $100 some dollars in material.

I do intend to contact your pastor if I have to.

I realized this morning this is really not about me.

Up until this point, I have been personalizing your disrespect and fighting the tendency to get angry.

This morning I realized what I really think is happening is God may want to put the spot light on this pattern in your life.

It wouldn’t have been so frustrating for me if I myself hadn’t been feeling a cash flow pinch.  Honestly, if I had several thousand dollars of “cushion” in the work checking account, I probably ….I say probably….wouldn’t have let this get under my skin like it has.

There is usually always two sides to every misunderstanding.

In this case, if it comes down to me having to sit down with you and your pastor (instead of taking you to small claims court)  I’m 95% sure this is a going to be a slam dunk win in my favor.

You’re not the first “christian” ( I use that term loosely) I’ve had dealings with  who have a nasty scrimping,  miserly worrisome attitude about money.

Jokingly (but seriously) I’ve said more than once, I would rather work for a bunch of pirates rather than work for  some  “christians.”

At least if I agreed to work for a pirate, I would know going into it what I was dealing with and proceed accordingly.

You are almost a contradiction in terms.

My friend Jim told me last week, he hoped you wouldn’t pay me   He told me, this may be the very thing you need to have happen…me asking to sit down with you and your pastor, so as to  put the spot light on this issue in your life.

I’m getting to the point this morning where I’m OK with that.

_____________________________________________

Update as of 6/18/2011 

I met with the customer in person this morning.  Long story short, I got paid.  The end

I don’t feel comfortable up there

      I started working for my dad when I turned 14.

  He and my uncle owned a construction company. 

 One of the questions they asked potential employees was, “Can you climb?”

They never asked me   

 I will be the first to tell you I am not comfortable 20 ft in the air, sitting on top of an  inch and 1/2  truss installing 2 by 6′s

  Heights in and of themselves, don’t bother me.., it’s having to climb around, trying to keep my balance  that gives me stress.  And it gets worse the older I get.  My balance, and  upper arm strength are  not what it was 25 years ago.  

 I think it’s called aging.

Work was getting slow last October so when a local farmer  asked me if I would be interested in helping  him build a machine shed over the Winter I didn’t think twice.  I knew there might be some climbing involved, but since  I can draw upon half a dozen  people locally who can climb,  I got the cement wall poured late last Fall with the understanding we could build the building whenever we had time.

       That time was this past week.

    And my labor pool suddenly evaporated.

Mitchell is in Las Vegas.

Randy and his crew are in the middle of building a restaurant that burnt down this past January.

and yours truly found himself 25  feet in the air over frozen rock.

    I have not had the energy the past few weeks to do much of anything when I got home from work.

   Tuesday we had the crane on the job site to swing in the rafters.   

 I was up and down  the 25 ft extension ladder 100 times. 

50% of the day, the fear was palatable.

  I went home exhausted.

Wednesday we picked up where we left off from Tuesday,   installing additional 2 by 6′s.

   On at least three occassions  Wednesday I felt like I was loosing my balance  and had to literally talk myself  into staying calm and figuring out where to put my hands next.  

 Nobody was going to be able to climb  up and “unstick” me. 

I miss all of you who take the time to stop by the blog, which is why I  thought I better post something to let you know what I’ve been “ up to.”   

  I haven’t been ruminating on anything profound, just trying to keep my balance.

Several years ago now,when I was still employed by my dad and uncle, we were building a large dairy loafing shed.  The concrete was already poured and we were working  20 ft in the air. 

 I said these words to my Uncle John “I don’t feel comfortable up there.”

      I’ve heard those words spoken behind my back on numerous occassions since. 

 And you know what?  I could care less.

         If you’re not comfortable in a  certain situation,then you have no business being there.  That’s when things happen.

      So what about you? 

 Talk to me.

 What have you been up to the past few weeks?  DM

Ask A Contractor

 

 Started working for my dad the summer I turned 14.

That was in 1974. 

You can do the math

One of the most popular blog posts on this site  is one I wrote  about big ears.  Last count there were over 120 comments.  The post has taken on a life of its own. 

  That’s kind of what I have in mind with this post.  An interactive conversation between me and thee where I field construction related questions.    

 Big or small, it makes no difference.  If I don’t know the answer I will tell you.   

      Since I’m not fielding anyone’s   question tonight , how about if I tell you what we’ve been doing this week?

    We’ve  been installing  100-year-old southern yellow pine barn beams on the ceiling  of a new addition  20 some  feet off the floor.  We took the  8 by 8 beams out of a 100 yr old barn, sand blasted and  varnished them.   Here are a few pictorial highlights from the week:

  

Beams arriving on the job site.  These averaged 17 feet long.

Picture of my lead carpenter cutting the end of the beam .  (Notice the joint in the beam behind him)

View from the top of the scaffolding

Finished product!

Now I could very easily have punted on that beam installation job.   I have another crew lined up to do the finish work.    But one of the things I love about construction is you’re constantly forced to learn new things and I wanted the challenge of figuring out how to take dirty old barn beams, cleaning them up and installing them in a new setting.

I discovered early on, that there is more than one way to frame  a house.  Turns out there is more than one way to shingle a roof, side or do window replacements.    It can get pretty confusing..then if you add the new type of products on the market.  Where can a person go to get trustworthy, unbiased advice?

Right here on this blog that’s where.

Why would I want to do that you might?

Because I love to teach.

I love to  mentor

I love my job and I’ve lived long enough to know that as my former co-worker Scott loved to say, “What comes around, goes around…”

and if I am willing to help a few people with construction related questions, who knows what sort of cool things might happen in my life…you never know, maybe I’ll end up with my own TV series.

One last picture from the barn beam project:

We are installing this beam as a mantle on the fireplace.  Check out the ax marks. This baby is probably from the 1860′s or before.  It is O-L-D

We found it in a small shed on the property where we are working.  The owners grandpa used to live on  the property, so this beam has some sentimental value.

So do you have any construction related questions?  Don’t sweat it if  you don’t…but how about you…what area(s) of life would you be willing to help the rest of us out on if we needed some direction?

The Chainreaction

     “Judy was looking over the receipt when we got home and noticed they’d only billed us for 2 plumbing fittings, when we’d actually gotten three.  She told me she’d go back and pay for the third one next time she was in town.”  

          excerpt of a conversation I had last Sunday morning with  Jim.

      “Dang, I  replied.  That is convicting.  Last month when we had all of those thunderstorms I sent Jordan to Stetsons  (a construction supply store) for  another reinforced tarp.  They run about $150.00 each.  Well, when he got back, they’d given him two but only billed me for one.  Hearing you tell me this story, makes me realize I need to go back and pay for that second tarp.  The kicker, is my insurance company won’t reimburse me for any of the tarps.  I spent over $450.00  on three tarps.  Guess I’m just going to have to eat it.”

       Jim then shared with me, several years ago he’d borrowed a ladder from work and had never gotten around to returning it.   As we talked, he told me he realized he needed to make it right with the ladder as well.

      I called Stetsons this morning and talked with Melissa.   I gave her the invoice number , told her how Jordan had come back with two tarps even though I’d only been billed for one.   She listened, then told me she’d be right back.  When she got back on the phone, she said, “Yep, we’re missing one from inventory.”

    “Thats’ me”  I said with a smile over the phone.  

     “Well, she said, I really appreciate your honesty. ”

     I’m thinking to myself…if you only knew. 

      “Well, I told her, my integrity is worth more than $150.00. ”

      I knew I’d done the right thing, even though I hadn’t done so  immediately. 

      I had rationalized to myself, that I had already taken a bath financially and this was just a small windfall in my favor.

   What I find interesting in all of this, is how me hearing about Judy’s decision to be honest  challenged me  to be honest,   which in turn triggered something in Jim to make restitution for a ladder…

which in turn……

     

The day I Filled in for Santa

 Picture of me in my “Get Up” visiting my Grandpa

      “What the heck are you doing in that outfit????”  Jeffrey P. asked me when I walked into the shop that morning.  It was about a week before Christmas and I decided to wear my new   $35.00 Santa outfit  to work.  You can do that sort of thing when you’re a subcontractor

     Ben and I  had been framing a small building over the mailboxes at Idlewild.     I thought to myself the night before- wouldn’t it be fun to dress up like Santa when we shingled ?   So that’s where that idea came from.

     Initially, Ben wasn’t sure he liked the idea of me drawing so much  attention to the two of us, but by the end of the day, he told  me, the  next time this happened  he was going to find  a green elf hat! 

      Couple of people stopped  and asked to take our picture.  Someone told me later, I made the local paper but I never saw it so I can’t be sure.  

      It was cold that day.- Single digits, so underneath my Santa out fit, I  had on my  Carharts.- that plus the beard, and I  was sweating like a pig in no time-  but we laughter and that made it all worth while.

        I’ve said this before but just in case you’ve never heard it: 

“Do what you love and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

       I love my job- (I’m a general contractor) and as you can tell, I don’t take myself too serious.  Now I can be as productive and focused as the next guy, but life is too short to not mix it up on occasion.  Nothing worse than a grumpy boss or a stodgy work enviroment. I  do have a choice in the attitudes I bring with me to work.

     On my commute home, I spotted a stranded motorist so I pulled over to see what he needed ( I still had my full get up on @ this point)  As it turned out, he’d  ran out of gas.  The guy had been drinking and when he leaned in the window and saw Santa Claus, I remember him slurring, “Nobody’s going to believe me when I tell them  Santa Claus stopped to help me out!”

     How about you- what is the craziest (or funniest )  thing you’ve ever done?   It doesn’t have to be in the context of work although it could be.  Tell me your story.