More than a feelin

http://open.spotify.com/track/40LGKU0kbnbx4NXEMhTTXT

Every now and then I get this feeling. I've always had trouble describing it. It's always fleeting, and if I focus on it too hard, it disappears. When I was younger I used to think it was a connection with my dad. Some type of father to son thing. Where the emotion is so strong I catch a whiff of it. I'm not sure why I thought that.
I felt it again tonight. Watching How I Met Your Mother on Netflix in a hotel room in Bethlehem. The last time I felt it I was mowing the lawn.
There's nothing before it. No precursor, no trigger. It just happens. Slow and heavy. Metaphysical and existential.
My body feels heavier than the world. My bones thinner than feathers, but the weight supported easily enough.
It's shapes and shades. Heavy powder. Soft metal. Trains on tooth picks. Boats on water.
It feels like triangles and funnels. Rods and cones.
Each tooth like Stonehenge, and my anatomy as loosely connected the lead shavings of Wooly Willy. A thousand pounds of flesh. No more no less.
It's such an in-body experience it stops me in my tracks each time. I imagine men in opium dens feel something similar, albeit more euphoric.
Mine is more a sudden awareness of weight and connectivity, and the realness of it makes me think in terms unreal. Dali for the flesh.

Nihilism

Eric Hutchinson – Food Chain - Live
Boy & Bear – Milk & Sticks
Eric Hutchinson – Oh!

Well, I'm almost done my first week of my new job doing compaction grouting. I took the job because I need more financial stability than the day to day flow that remodeling afforded me. And the promise of $60/hr prevailing wage jobs put stars in my eyes.
The first day was a harsh call to reality. 45 degrees and raining. I was warned beforehand that the work is extremely grueling- and it proved to be. The work isn't so much what bothers me though. Rarely if ever had I found myself saying, "I deserve to be getting paid more." But $12/hr just isn't enough.  I know that if I stick it out I'll pick up jobs where I'll be making 30-70/hr. But I just think the time in between is too great.
They told me during my interview that this work isn't for everyone. That not everyone can do it. I know I can do it, but I also know that it's not the smartest way to make 700/wk. The guys I work with talk about the overtime and the 30/day per diem. The per diem covers your food for the day, so these guys are kidding themselves when they talk about how great it is to get this tax free. The overtime is nice, but it should really be base pay. At least. When you hit 18/hr. It's almost like a slap in the face for the last 40 hours you worked for 12.
I've never minded hard work, but I think the most glaring realization that they're not paying us enough is the company I'm keeping in my coworkers- men driven largely by their id. Men, nihilists to the core. Not because they subscribe to nihilism, or even grasp the concept, but because they've long since written off their bodies in sacrifice to the day's work. The type of guys that rack up debt over cellphone ringtones and survive largely on chicken wings and dunkin donuts. While I try to maintain the belief that I'm not above any man, I have trouble relating to many of the guys I work with. And when you're spending a week away from home in a hotel with the guys you work with, these interactions matter. I'm fortunate that I have my laptop and internet to escape to, but smiling and nodding only lasts so long.
I find myself starting each work day borderline defeated at the prospect of another 10 hour day shoveling sand, moving 100 lb bags of cement, carrying 40 lb pipes 100 yds across a muddy path- all with wet feet and hands. In truth, the work isn't even the hardest part. It's the cold, and the wet, and the never ending finish line. Think deadliest catch without the payday. Think oil drillers, but we're pumping cement into the ground instead of pumping oil out.
It's the kind of work that forces you to find solace in the smallest reprieves. We can't take time for lunch- so a sip of coffee, a bite of a sandwich, a cigarette- are about all you have to look forward to. It kind of helps me understand why the guys I work behave the way I do. When you condition yourself to seek comfort in the smallest of dopamine dumps, this becomes a driving factor of your life. Why pay your child support or save for a car when you can buy a leather jacket or knock up a stripper?
I've already started looking for other jobs, but I think this job will forever shape me for the better in the end. I'll have this from now on to measure other jobs against. I'll know what it's like to work your hands to the bone, to be cold and wet and dead tired, and still have 6 hours to go. I think this job will drive me to appreciate what comes next, and to not take for granted what I have now. I also know now what my body can do- what it's really like to work for a living.
Let's just hope I can stick it out until something better comes along. And let's hope it comes quickly.

Behind the 8 ball

Joe Purdy – I Love The Rain The Most
Boy & Bear – Milk & Sticks

As I become more and more entrenched in the blue collar workaday world I'm learning more and more about how things, people, and money work.  The more I learn, I can't help but feel that I'm more than a bit behind the 8 ball.
For starters, I'm really just getting my foot on the bottom rung of the work ladder. As far as I can tell, there seem to be 3 tiers of this ladder- helper, skilled laborer, boss. 100/day, 200-300/day, 500+/day respectively.  I think I've always thought of money in terms of yearly salary. I guess because I assumed that I would one day have a steady paycheck with a corporate logo on it, I would think in this term of currency. This isn't exactly how it works in the under-the-table world. There have been weeks of recent where I've made more money than I ever have in my life. A flat 500 from my role as a helper on a remodeling job, 50 for a couple hours of ceiling restoration with my uncle, another 200 for an hours' work closing a pool on my own.
As I make this money, I can't help but marvel at how much money you have to make money. At 500/wk I'm on track for a 25,000/yr. If I can work my way up to 1,000/wk I'll be on track for a 50,000 year. I'd have to make 400/day. 5 days a week. 50 weeks a year. Just to make $100k.
While in school, I always had a number close to $60k floating around in the back of my head. I figured I'd start off around there, and work my way up to the 200s within a decade or so. I guess I never really realized how much all of that money really is.
$800/day is A LOT of money. Money is a real thing. Not just a number. And working for 100/day really puts that into perspective.
While all of these thoughts of money dance like visions of sugarplums in my dome I feel like I'm learning some very important lessons that I failed to learn in all of my schooling.
SAVE. Save as much as you can while you can. I've been ever so fortunate enough that I've always had enough savings that I've had a safety net. Because I've gambled most of these savings on my business venture, I've come dangerously close to scraping the bottom.
Ask for more. Perhaps I'd have a larger safety net sitting in the bank right now if I'd been less hesitant to ask for more. The people I've done Abstract Concrete work for make a few hundred a day. They should be able to afford to pay someone else comparably to do the things they can't. Prices are going to have to go up this Spring.
Live well within your means. I'm fortunate that I have relatively low overhead, but even still 1,000/month in insurance/gas/truck payments is a heck of a lot when I'm lucky to make 2,000/month.
Make yourself invaluable. Having come close to the ledge, I realize how fortunate I am to have work- no matter how irregular it may be. Knowing this, I'm all too happy to work for every cent I get. Also, good help is hard to find- and if you can create value for yourself, people don't mind paying top dollar to get you to help them.

So. Could I have learned all of this 6 years ago had I gone straight into the workforce from high school? Or did I need 4 years of undergrad and 2 years of grad to figure out where I'm going and what I need to end up where I want?

Two Feet of Oak

Benjamin Francis Leftwich – Atlas Hands
We Were Promised Jetpacks – It's Thunder And It's Lightning

Far and away one of my favorite experiences has to be going to a bar by myself and listening to music. I'm not sure why I find this so cathartic. I think it's interaction deprivation coupled with sensory overload that makes me feel so good. There's just something about being alone in a crowded room that helps me clear my head and see things in a different light. My go-to soundtrack has been Bon Iver's Bon Iver, but I've also listened to Watch the Throne, and my Spotify playlist. I let my mood dictate the music and the setting.
Most people go out to the local watering hole to grab a bite, maybe watch the game, bump into a fellow barfly. I like all of this too, but there's something special about walking in with a set of headphones on and savoring a Jameson with whatever quiet you prefer. I feel like this somehow heightens the few interactions I do have. Relying on eye contact, hand signals and facial gestures to order another drink, signal a chair is open, close out a tab. Take of the conversation, and it all feels a little deeper. It's easy enough to tell a couple that the seat next to you is open, but to let them know with a smile and a nod makes the interaction a little more intimate.
I think another reason I enjoy this so much is that I've come to associate this activity with travel. Excitement and opportunities.  It makes me think of the times I've spent sitting in an airport bar. Getting ready to take off for vacation, or a conference, or training. Kind of the calm before the storm. The last chance to steel myself before I take off on something new.

Beginnings

Cosmic Love
We don't eat

have got to be the most stressful part of any relationship. I'm sure that some people would argue that endings are the most difficult. But endings are easy. Finite. They may be painful, surely,but they're short lived. There's also a sort of beauty in the chaos of endings. Something primal gets satisfied in the separation. The fight or flight. The lone wolf mentality. The build up of emotions, and the explosion that sets the two apart like the Big Bang.
Beginnings are tough though. I'm not sure why they still are tough for me, but they are. Throughout my long and arduous dating career, the beginnings have always been plagued by the same set of uncertainties that seem to draw out insecurities and anxieties. Never at any other time in a relationship is so much self worth based on a single text or phone call.
"okayy" with two 'y's'. Must mean she likes me.
No response for two hours. Must mean she's not interested.
Random texts saying hey. Must mean she's thinking about me.
Asking to know what I'm up to. Maybe she's too needy.
All of this agonized over for hours. Trying to connect faint dots, and draw on past experiences, to try and  guess what the other is thinking about.
Then there's the obligatory lapse in communication. You don't hear from her for a few days, so you reach out. Finally, at what seems like the 11th hour, they return your call or text.
I lost my phone. I fell asleep. My battery died, and I left my charger at a friend's.
This seems to be a constant. No matter the girl. No matter the relationship. A gulf opens that threatens to swallow your feelings, pride, and future plans inside of it.
So what causes this? These same feelings threaten even the most minor of relationships. Sometimes I'll not even have a desire to continue a relationship, yet still that gulf opens up, and I find myself wondering how I can live without her.
This from someone who goes out of his way to be alone. To have time to myself. To keep people at a distance.
I think it's my need to understand people that drives this self doubt, this need to analyze. I need to know what to expect. Because uncertainty is the bane of my existence. The thing that keeps me up at night. The things that drives my fears. It's not sharks that I'm afraid of. It's the uncertainty of what's lurking below me, next to me. Show me an enemy I can fight, and I'll rise. But put that same danger behind a door, and I start to defeat myself.
The thing about a relationship is that it's not just one person. I of course know how I'll react in any situation. How I am alone. But you lose that when you enter a relationship.
There might be strength in numbers, but it takes time to get there. And while I know my strength alone, it seems to take a hit each time someone tries to join their strength with mine.

Stop Time

Higher Love
Someone Like You

I know scent is the strongest sense tied to memory. Although I only went there a handful of times when I was very young, I still get taken back to my Grandparents house in Cambridge when someone just comes in from smoking a cigarette.  The smell of cum trees takes me back to a spring day when I was riding my bike up Kimberwick (a street I would later be arrested on on the same bicycle). And the smell of a certain cologne reminds me of dead fish, because my brother used half a bottle of it to cover up the smell of his when it died.
In a whiff, a breath, these fragrant time capsules take me back to times and moments I haven't thought of in years or decades.
For me, I think a close second in terms of epoch recall is music. Music has played both an active and passive role in my life. Sometimes only as background music as life carries on, and other times as a tool to suppress or embellish certain feelings or emotions.
Sometimes hearing a certain song can have such a strong trigger that I'm immediately taken back to a time in my life. Reading Lord of the Rings, driving in my tinted, black Honda with chrome rims, breaking up with a girlfriend, grade school dances, rolling in the gym, sitting in the back of my Mom's minivan. Uncle Kracker, Tupac, Korn, Crazy Town, Cloudkicker, Seal...
While not as jarring as the trigger of scent, music is captured much more easily.  My newest addiction has been building a truly beautiful playlist on Spotify. With cassettes and tapes, music was often lost too easily, or borrowed too freely. By keeping track of my music digitally I feel like I can capture tiny moments and keep them forever.
Not only do I enjoy finding these gems by scouring music websites, but linking this great music to new and powerful memories is also rewarding. I might not remember a certain Black Keys song, or a certain moment in the back of Ant's Jeep in 20 years, but if I keep collecting and adding, I just might be able to live a moment over again that I otherwise would have forgotten.

The times they are a changing

Moves
Wolf Like Me

David started his first week of classes at Neumann this week.  For the first time in nearly twenty years, I won't be starting school again.
When I was very young school was a terrifying experience. It meant being ripped from my Mother's thigh and thrust into a new situation with strange people. I remember standing at the top of my driveway begging not to be sent to school. I couldn't wrap my head around why my parents were trying to punish me this way.
In grade school going back meant no more countless hours spent riding dirtbikes, building forts, playing street hockey, and swimming.  Each year was a radical change from the next. New teachers, new classrooms, new subjects.  Looking back on it, I think that grade school may have held the greatest shifts from year to year.
High school was scary at first. By the end of grade school I'd grown comfortable with my surroundings and the people I'd come to know.  High school was a total departure from that. I remember thinking how much like men and women the seniors looked. The was also an air of responsibility that hung lightly over the whole high school experience.  We weren't given much rope to hang ourselves with, just enough to trip ourselves up.
I was slightly more confident entering college. Most of my peers were worried about whether or not they'd chosen the right school. I was more concerned whether or not I could handle the work, and what the hell it was I was going to do with my life.
I'm not sure how I feel about this year's depart from the norm. In the past, each year held some anxiety but also a lot of hope. I usually went into the year remorseful for the free time lost, but excited for the opportunities it held. Opportunities to learn, be exposed to new information, and meet new friends. Each Fall was a welcome interruption to a blissful summer.
This year's fall feels like a ticking clock. There are only a few more earning months left until the cold of winter ends my work for the year.
As I talk with Dave about syllabus week, finding his classes, getting to know teachers, and finding the best deals on textbooks, I can't help but feel that I'd like to be a college student for at least a little while longer.