Essays and Etcetera

I am the sort of person who is always doing “something,” a “something” which can be describe as some productive project or getting into trouble–this depending somewhat on what I am currently doing, and your opinion of what defines “trouble.”

I like to work with my hands. I like to fix and make things. During the seasons of good weather I will usually have some endeavour under way, either of creative or practical import. Such was my life, but when I began taking care of Grandpa this habit was interrupted. When you are spending most of your time caring for someone with Alzheimer’s you don’t have much time for projects. For two years I had a nearly complete absence of hands-on work, except for an undertaking involving a very large pile of dirt and a very old wheelbarrow. (But that is a story for a different time.)

This past summer I decided it was time to end this sabbatical. At that point Grandpa was so far along in the progression of Alzheimer’s that there was much less I could do for him. It was a situation ripe for making a person feel helpless and useless and I decided I need to put myself back to practical use–to fight off the despair, and to take my mind off Grandpa’s failing condition.

The Patio

In the spring I decided to make a small patio out back, providing myself with a more pleasant environment in which to use the propane grill. The enclosed porch/sun room also need some lattice to beautify its base, so this was worked into the project. Consulting with Grandma, we decided on a very modest patio area, built from concrete pavers. All in all it was a nice little project–the minor complications being that I didn’t have a truck, I was working alone, and I still had to care for Grandpa. I solved the first problem by borrowing my brother Teman’s truck to haul the supplies from Lowes, I ignored the second issue because I am still young and healthy (and perhaps slightly deranged), and as for the last matter–well, I handled it as best I could. Trying to not “abandon” Grandpa and yet work on the project added some stress, and I felt a bit guilty, but at the same time when the end of the day came around and I could see that I had actually done something I felt good, too.

The patio project was simple, but this did not keep me from having disasters. It is a rare feat for me to get through any project without at least one minor disaster, and this is why (much as I enjoy working with my hands) I hope to never be employed by someone else in this manner. When I have a disaster while working for myself I can say “Oopsie,” then laugh or cry as the situation warrants and get on with my life. If I were working for someone else and were so feeble as to commit a mistake then honor and mortification would require me to rush out and find the nearest bridge from which to hurtle myself and thus atone for my miserable failure. Unreasonable? Perhaps. But knowing my temperament I avoid such employment and situations as might put me in that emotional state.

The first mistake in the patio project was my preoccupied forgetfulness. Grandma and I discussed two different patio sizes, and settled on the smaller dimension. I then forgot this little fact, either by failure to write it down, failure to look at what I had written down, or just plan caught up in my original grand vision. In any case, I went out and bought the correct amount of supplies for the smaller patio dimension, then dug out the ground for the larger patio dimension. I remained blissfully unaware of my stupidity until after I had finished digging the foundation, laying the fabric cloth, pouring and leveling the sand, and was halfway to three-quarters done laying the pavers I had bought. At that point I said, “Gee, it doesn’t look like I have enough pavers to cover all the area I have.”

And the truth struck like a lightning bolt.

In this case it was no great crises. I went out and bought the pavers I was short, and the resulting patio looks better for the increased size. But in the moment of realizing my mistake I was exceedingly grateful that I was not in the business working for someone else. I could just picture myself coming up to the suburban homeowner: “Um, heh, you know how I dug up that large portion of your lawn? Well, it turns out I only needed to dig up half of that, and now you’ll have to fork over more money so I can build you an even bigger patio.” I just about died thinking of the imagined fool I would be in that imagined job, and swore once again that I would never go into the business doing this sort of thing.

A minor irritant–but thankfully not a disaster–occurred at Lowes when I was picking up the initial load of pavers. It was not my fault (for once) but this did not make it much less irritating. The number (and weight) of the pavers made it unwieldy to drag the cart(s) of them through the store to the checkout. The supposed routine was for me to check out my smaller items and then drive the truck around to the gated Lawn and Garden exterior section of the store and have a fork-lift place the pavers on my truck.

It was a brilliant plan, but like all brilliant plans it died in the hands of corporate America. A manager was notified that he would have to unlock the gate to the Lawn and Garden loading area, but by the time I got out to the truck, loaded my minor items, and drove around to the gate, the manager had gone on break. The only person waiting was a peon who had neither the authority nor a key to unlock the gate. I had a headache, and there was a chill spring mist in the air adding to the unpleasantness of standing around waiting.

We waited and waited. Another peon came and used the forklift to bring the pallet of pavers up to the gate, but this peon didn’t have a key to open the gate either. Still we waited. The peons suggested I rip the manager when he finally arrived. Much as my mood was heading in that direction, what I really wanted was for the manager to show so that gate could be opened and I could have the truck quickly loaded. At that point I would have been willing to thank the manager for showing up, late or not.

What I should have done was not waited another minute but went back into the store and raised hell with somebody besides a peon so I could get the pavers I had paid good money for. Instead I told the two peons, “Look, just pass the pavers through the crack in the gate and I’ll load them into the truck.”

I always chose the stupidest solution, in case you were wondering.

“You sure?” they said. (Probably thinking, “Is this guy nuts?”)

“Yes, I’m sure.” It beat standing around in the mist waiting for some selfish, lazy, manager to come off break.

So the two peons passed the pavers through the crack in the gate. I then loaded the 3/4 of a ton or so of stone pavers into the truck. All. By. Myself. I did it, and with a pounding headache besides. The two peons wandered off to do whatever peons do with nary an profuse apology or offer to come out and help. I was pretty peeved at Lowes by the time I was done. Perhaps some day I will become smart enough to go into the store and demand that someone get the ball moving after waiting five minutes instead of waiting fifteen mintues to half an hour and then loading it all myself.

I was very thankful to get home without further trouble.

That evening I had to go back to Lowes for another load because the truck couldn’t carry the weight of sand and pavers in one trip. This time ended in disaster. At Lowes I actually got competent help the second time and with a forklift in action I had the truck loaded with my 27 or so bags of sand in a jiffy. But my brilliance was my undoing.

I have a bit of a phobia about transporting stuff. I always have this nagging fear that somehow it will all come loose to an accompanying great disaster, embarrassment, and perhaps police trouble. I never want to be the poor fellow you see on the highway who has his stuff scattered down the last two miles of road.

So . . .

My second load from Lowes consisted primarily of the twenty-something 50 lbs bags of sand and some eight foot plastic lattice panels. How was I going to get all of this into the truck? Since Teman’s truck had an extended cab I couldn’t get the lattice to lay flat without dropping the back gate. I had visions of the light lattice blowing away if I put it on top so I put the lattice on the bottom and stacked the sand on top. The bags of sand would keep the plastic panels in place, I figured.

The rest of you experienced people can stop sniggering up your sleeve now.

I was a very cautious and careful fellow driving home and by some miracle managed to not dump my load on any of the people behind me at the various stops on the way. Then I came to the last intersection a mere hundred yards from Grandma’s driveway. At that point I was nearly giddy with relief. I was home-free. Everything was done. No big disasters this time. And so I accelerated out of that stop perhaps just a little faster than the other times. Just fast enough to break the slight friction holding the slick plastic panels in the bed of the truck and send them to sleighing out the back, neatly depositing my entire load smack in the middle of the road.

I remained completely obviously and happily drove the rest of the way home. (See why you should never hire me?)

As I pulled into the driveway I noticed a truck following close behind me, and thought it rather odd. But I figured maybe someone was just using the driveway to turn around, so I ignored the vehicle, parked, and hopped out.

“Hey! Hey, sir! Were you carrying a load?”

Were.

Never had the past tense carried such dreadful meaning.

“Because if you were . . .”

“Oh, dear Lord,” I said, horrified realization coming in an instant.

“It’s just back at the intersection, come on!” the man said.

We hopped back into our trucks and zipped back to the scene of the crime. Never have I hurled bags of sand so fast. I was flipping them into the truck one right after another. Another passerby stopped and helped load. The three of us had the truck loaded in record time. They had my profuse apologies. No police showed up.

It could have been a much worse disaster. Instead, it was a minor disaster, a big embarrassment, and one of those country-life male bonding experiences.

I guess.

Such was the excitement from the patio project. Beyond all of that I am very happy to report everything went smoothly.

Building Barn Doors

I have never built barn doors before this summer. The closest I came was a door to a goat shed. Even if you have constructed and mounted a barn door before it is not a project you are ever advised to undertake by yourself for the simple reason that mounting long lengths of metal track is difficult to do by yourself and mounting an eight foot door by yourself can be a bit dicey. Not deterred by these facts of reality, I undertook building and mounting two new barn doors for Grandma, all by myself.

I will admit the only thing that allowed me to do this was the fact that the faceboard over the old bard doors was level, which allowed me to use it as a guide for mounting my track. If that hadn’t been the case doing the project by myself would have been extremely difficult, if not impossible. It also helped that I am still very fit, and so remain dexterous and able to lift heavy objects with one arm. (Translate: I can do dangerous things on a ladder.) Nonetheless, there were a couple times when the whole process was a little dicey. If you have ever tried holding an eight foot 2×8 up to a line with one hand while nailing the board with the other hand–well, you probably haven’t tried but let me tell you it was about the very limit of my dexterity, strength, and patience.

If you are comfortable with the principles of carpentry then the theory of constructing track barn doors and mounting them is simple. The only really challenge I had was doing it all by myself. I honestly wasn’t sure I would be able to pull it off solo. With each door being eight feet wide, I wasn’t at all sure I would be able to mount them on the track alone. I simply dragged them out and gave it a try. They were a bit heavy, but the biggest problem was the fact that I could only work one end at a time when it came to mounting. Grandma thought I couldn’t do it, and watched (or gaped) as I righted first one door and balanced it precariously then slid it onto the track and then did the same with the other.

A quick test showed both doors slide smoothly and easily in their track and hung true.

I was very pleased.

To finish the project off I replaced the old wooden panel in front of the loft opening with a sliding glass window.

The Bike Shed

With the barn doors as a warm up, my next project was building a 10×10 bike shed for Mom. I have built other structures of similar size before, so there was nothing intrinsically challenging about the task. Since the only time I had to work on the shed was during my one day off from taking care of Grandpa (when someone else would watch him) the only real issue I was working with was time constraints. So the one challenge I set for myself was to build the shed as quickly and efficiently as possible.

A good part of the first day was spent at Lowes picking up the supplies. The journey home this time was uneventful, though I was uneasy for the entire journey because I had over-loaded Teman’s truck and the trailer to fit all of the lumber in one trip. I drove home very slowly, envisioning all sorts of disasters.

It was already afternoon by the time I reached Mom and Dad’s and began working on construction. I had plenty of help for building the shed, so the important thing in this project was to make sure I knew exactly what needed to be done, in what order, and know who to tell to do what. I think I succeeded in my aim for efficiency and speed. I worked hard, and late, the first day–to nearly 11:00 PM. By the end of the first day almost half of the roof sheathing was on, and some of the wall sheathing. Dad volunteered to watch Grandpa so I could work a second day, and by the end of the second day I had the roof completed and all of the wall sheathing tacked on.

In basic form, I had the 10×10 shed built in two days. Given the constraints I worked with, I felt I couldn’t ever expect to do better.

As the final touch I built and hung the doors later, at my leisure. I also built two bike racks for the shed using ripped 2x4s. I felt a bit like a genius for this (or at least brilliantly frugal) because the bike hanging gear you can purchase is pretty pricey. For the cost of a hanging hook for a single bike I built two racks for a total of eight or so bikes. Ha. Beat that Walmart.

The Cabinet

I am not–and never will be–a true finish carpenter. I think that even if I had all of the right equipment, I would still be a little short on patience. For really good finish carpentry you need good tools and a lot of patience and attention to detail. Because of my personal flaws, I will never be able to boast about the beauty of my finished carpentry work, but that doesn’t keep me from dabbling in it for fun.

I decided to build a cabinet from scratch, according to my own design, just because. This is the first cabinet I have ever built, a complete learning experience. If a real carpenter saw it he would have a fit. The cabinet is very solid, but I made some mistakes, and did a number of ugly things. For this cabinet I can say in my defense that I was learning, and I didn’t have all the right tools. (I was using a framing chop-saw and trying to get by with a shortage of proper clamps.) I will never make finished carpentry as a professional job but as a challenge and mind-stretching experience for myself I enjoy it.

Of all the the projects I did last summer I think the cabinet intimidated me the most. Building the cabinet required a lot of precise cutting. Staring at the pile of lumber and starting the cutting–believing that it would all come together in the cabinet at the end–was an act that gave me pause.

Perhaps the biggest mistake I made was purchasing a sheet of stainless steel that was far too heavy gauge. I just about broke my thumbs trying to cut the thing down to size with tin snips (I told you I don’t have the right tools), and the difficulty in working with it made the finished top not come out as polished as I had hoped. Also, I felt like a giant idiot when I realized (after the fact) that I had put the wrong side of the stainless steel up (I put the better face down). On the positive side (I say dryly) the steel top of the cabinet should make a good shield in the event of a gun-battle.