Entry for Thursday, June 29, 2006
Another work day began as usual. 5:45am wakeup call, breakfast, mass and off to the worksite by 9:30am. Typically, this would be like the middle of the night for me; I’m a nocturnal creature. However, after waking up at around 6am for the past five days my body cycle had adapted itself to the radical shift. I was still tired, though. My eyes were heavy and I took a nap in the van. Suddenly, I was awoken by clicking noises from behind me. Someone was snapping pictures of me. I turned around and caught Rachel and Princess Dia with cameras. I sprayed Rachel with the spray bottle and vowed to get back at Dia. Melissa then swiped the spray bottle and soaked Rachel and other people in the car. It got kind of silly, as things did more and more as the week progressed. When a group spends days at a time together like we did, inevitably people are going to start ragging on each other. That’s when you know you’ve gotten pretty close.
Day two of work on Janella’s house began. It was remarkable how our assembly-line work style snapped into action – Janis scraping up the tile, Kelly and Carissa taking out the garbage (maybe a good career ladies ), Matt owning the kitchen as only an Italian can, Pat ripping out door frames (and cooling everyone off with the spray bottle), yours truly tearing out more dry wall and so on. Everybody seemed to find their niche and naturally gravitate toward where the work was needed, always offering relief and encouragement. We were a team.
Despite my aggressive style I developed, I learned to exercise more finesse with the axe (sort of like the one Jack Nicholson used in "The Shining"). Instead of primitively bashing, I cut large square sections of dry wall and tore them out in big sheets. A much more effective and less physically draining method. It was particularly fun when Bryan and I gave Dia a boost up and she ripped down sections of the ceiling in the backroom. It was kind of dangerous, but she really enjoyed it. During the group meeting that night, she said it was one of the highlights of her day. Too bad we couldn’t do the same with the other rooms. Our brave leader Mark turned into some kind of crazed chimp and kicked out the rest of the ceiling from the rafters.
I can’t forget to mention that I did exact revenge on Dia. I’m such a good Catholic, I know. During a break, she was out on the porch and I soaked her with water from the window. She didn’t know who she was dealing with.
As work finished up on the first section, Bryan, Dia and I began to tear out dry wall in the second section of the house. It was the same as the first section: living room, kitchen, bathroom, etc. Cheryl soon joined us. I showed her my technique with the dry wall and it seemed to work for her. She cleared through a wall and the bedroom closet area pretty quickly. I don’t mean to take any credit, though, because it was really her persistence that got the job done.
Within a couple hours, more and more people trickled over to the second section. Andrea (alternatively taking some pictures. she’s a photojournalist, you know, so they’re going to look great) and Melissa ripped out nails. Mary and the Banger sisters, Kelly & Carissa, helped clear out the debri, and so on.
I tore out more sheets of dry wall in the front room. Dia made out holes in the ceiling break and I tore out clean strips of dry wall. In the kitchen, I was surprised at how easy I was able to rip out the cabinets and other appliances, especially the dishwasher. Of course, the mold helped, but still…I would never look at my kitchen the same way again.
When our work day was over, Mark said we only had about a few more hours of work left on the house. As we would find out the next day, he was right. Pat commented later that it was probably the group’s most productive work day because all fourteen of us were there for the entire duration. I agree. I also think we had refined our work ethic, especially with the adults. Sometimes they can undermine their endurance, lamenting the bygone days of their youth, but I don’t think they had any problem keeping up with the students. As far as I saw it, everybody was at the same level. No one was used to this kind of physical rigor and yet each person carried their load, which, I think, reflected the group’s clear sense of purpose.
For dinner they served a combination of all the delicious New Orleans food from the previous three days: red bean rice, chicken gumbo and jambalaya! I went back up for seconds and thirds. I loved it. Funny thing is I happened to catch the one priest, coined ‘Father Newman’, by Jerry, after Newman from “Seinfeld”, walking toward the kitchen with a big bowl. Mmmn, what could he be up to? Ironically enough, in the infamous Soup Nazi episode of “Seinfeld”, when Elaine drives the Soup Nazi out of business, Newman goes to the Soup Nazi’s restaurant with a big bowl to retrieve some of the last soup before it’s gone. Jerry laughed. The parallels were staggering. Throughout the week, I traded favorite “Seinfeld” moments with Jerry and especially Bryan – both huge “Seinfeld” fans. We laughed like hell. In the van, Bryan and I shot “Seinfeld” references back and forth at lighting speed. Often it was spurred by things related to our experiences on the trip, like low-flow showers, bad female drivers, vans, spicy food, jambalaya, demented clowns and, when things got tense, “serenity now!” The references were unending, which brought us to conclude that the show was like a lexicon of the human experience. “You can relate “Seinfeld” to everything in life,” said Bryan.
posted by kevin @ 8:37 PM
0 comments
