I would not consider myself a “handy” man. Well lets not single me out… no one would consider me a handy – man. I was the guy would had absolute zero shame in “calling a guy” as opposed to figuring out how to handle said home project with these paws of mine. But… enter this new journey that I find myself navigating these days and “calling a guy” is not something that I have the ability to do. Now… there are certainly guys here who work in the plumbing department… and the construction department… and the paint department but it is frowned upon to call your brethren to handle a task that you can do yourself. So… lets talk about this past week.
The powers that be at work decided that our OM (Officer’s Mess Hall) needed a little change and a whole ‘glow up’ was in order. We were told that they were going to be ordering new tables and chairs… getting rid of the booths that are currently in place… ordering a new flat top grill… a coffee machine… an ice / water machine and a few other upgrades that would really make us shine in 2025. “Cool… sounds good to me. Just let me know what you guys need from us”… I told him when my boss explained the plan to me. “Sounds good. Will let you know when everything arrives”… he said and we went about our day. Well… this past week… everything arrived.
I head into work at 430am on Monday morning and I am met at the door by my boss. “Hollywood. Everything is here. Need you guys to start taking apart the booths… the construction guys will come and take everything away once your done then just put the tables and chairs together and we will figure out the grill and ice machine after that.” “Got it. So you want us to show the construction guys everything and then we are closed for the day or what?”… I say… totally steam rolling past that whole ‘need YOU guys’ part of his sentence. “No… you guys will do it all and then they will just take it away and clean up. Thanks”… and he walks away. “Well sh*t”… I think to myself. I head into the dining room and stare at the 12 booths and tables for a good 5 minutes… wondering where to even begin. There are a couple tool bags on the floor and my number 2 walks in behind me and joins me in my bewildered gaze at our project. “Alright man… lets figure this out.” Wrenches deployed and away we go. It takes us a while to figure out the first booth but once we get the lay of the land… we are on a roll and tear that room apart for the next 4 hours. And honestly… it felt fantastic. Not only was it therapeutic to get some stress out by ‘dismembering’ the entire room… it was extremely gratifying to complete a task. A task that at the onset… neither one of us had absolutely any idea how we were going to successfully do and a task that in our previous lives… we would have undoubtedly “farmed out” to someone else. But we were and are perfectly able to do it ourselves… and we did just that… and it felt wonderful.
That feeling of accomplishment was swiftly met with our next task… strip, buff and wax the entire dining room. “Okay. Strip and wax the floor…. strip and wax the floor… hmmmm… how the f*ck do I do that?” Thankfully one of the homeboys brought in the chemicals… the buffer and tools needed to tackle the job. He was also armed with the knowledge of how to do it himself so he gave us a little tutorial and off we went. We finished in a few hours and if I do say so myself… that dining room looked immaculate. The floor was shining like it was brand new and smooth as ice. Hands on labor… does the mind good. Next on our list was to assemble the tables and chairs. As the fellas in here would say… “easy money”… I think to myself as I remember assembling my sons’ cribs and rocking chairs… “I got this”. And we did… all chairs and tables were assembled and ready for business without issue by the end of the day.
We show up the next morning… primed and ready as ever to tackle the ice/water machine. Which (for me) was going to be the biggest learning experience as I have never found studs… busted up dry wall… laid pipe (well…. 🙂 sorry Mom) RAN pipe…. connected drainage…. built a dip/draining system and closed it all back up again before plugging the actual machine in and praying it all works. But lets do this! We called in a couple of the plumbing homeboys who would run our “crew” and then we got to work. I was using magnets to find studs in the wall… I was breaking through dry wall like a pro… I was fastening pipes together like I used to do with my son’s marble towers (great practice for plumbing jobs btw… who knew??)… I was securing a table with a 2×4 that we attached to the wall… I mean… I was making it happen in there. And when everything was said and done… and we plugged in that glorious ice and water machine… and that water dripped on down through the system we built and flowed flawlessly into the drain… Man… I felt like I really did something in this life.
In all seriousness… the lesson that I walked away with at the end of the week was to lean into the uncomfortable. I would have never learned the skills that I learned these past 7 days if I was not forced into completing these projects with my own two hands as opposed to calling someone else in to do it for me. And I am proud of my new skills and I feel good about accomplishing something… doesn’t matter what that something is… it just feels good to complete a task.
So the next time you are presented with ‘something’ out there in the real world that sounds like it is completely out of your comfort zone or not in your tool box as it relates to a skillset… instead of throwing in the towel and looking elsewhere… hit up google and get to work. I can almost guarantee that you won’t regret it. It may be extremely frustrating along the way… but it wouldn’t feel so good when it’s over if it was easy gettin’ there.
Stay Healthy. Stay Active. Stay comfortable Getting Uncomfortable.