this morning, our fearless leader mike popped out the side door of the house and told us how psyched he was that he could trust us to handle the concrete on our own. michael, magen, corinto and i looked at each other, like, “is he talking to us?”
he was. apparently, now we know concrete. in the words of magen tracy, “it kind of made my day.”
corinto posing with the rebar for our concrete
then, in the afternoon, mike taught “team concrete” how to case doors. this task consisted of measuring the reveal around the door frame, hammering the neighboring sheet rock so it’s flush, and finally nailing the pre-cut casing (the molding around every door that you see) over both with a whole lot of precision. suffice it to say that we weren’t so great at it. and yet, after just 2.5 doors, mike seemed to think we were ready to measure and cut our own casings for the closets, and – even more surprisingly – capable enough to teach “team closet” the process.
team closet (leigh and joe)
i don’t think i’m alone when i say that the pendulum in my comfort zone swings from confidence to insecurity as i fumble through most of our assignments. it’s joyful, humbling work. before we left today, we got to meet bennie, one of the homeowners of 1839 allen street. he was bouncing around his future living room, thanking us profusely for our help, and in those moments i forgot about any ineptitude of the day and was just really grateful to be of any use at all to new orleans and its remarkable citizens.
it’s pretty darn wondrous that i can know so much more and yet so much less than i did just a few days ago.
- what is knowing? - May 11, 2011
Roya
Hi, Gilly!
Great work! I’m glad you’re having such a great (and humbling) experience so far!
Roya
Rob Hochschild
I need you guys to come over my building and pour me a patio or something! Great work down there. It’s really great to hear how it’s going.
Jenna
I guess that makes Marian and me “team window sill,” then! 🙂