Time

It was my birthday this past Friday and I’ve been thinking a lot about time and its passage. I haven’t written on this blog for weeks because I’ve been busy and suddenly a whole lot of time has gone by without writing. I’ve been working a lot of hours lately and the summer has passed by in a heartbeat. Kids I’ve known and loved since their first days in this world are now young adults. My parents have reached the age of retirement. A majority of the friends in my life have now been with me longer than they haven’t. I’m old enough to be the mother of some of the boys at work. I was feeling quite overwhelmed with the sense that time is gushing past me and I can’t stem the tide.

Although I’m often reflective around my birthday, turning 39 seems to be a milestone of sorts. I began to slow down and think about time and its effect on me. The biggest thing seems to be the realization that I likely won’t have kids. The window is rapidly shrinking and even though some women do have them in their 40s, the likelihood that I am going to be one of those women is pretty low. And the funny thing is, I’ve made peace with that and have begun to think about what shape my life is going to take as a single, capable woman with a lot of options. In only a year and a half I will have my ticket and be able to work anywhere in the world. I can travel. I can move anywhere I want to move. I can shape my life into anything I want it to be with nothing restricting me.

The fact that I now have options is something kind of new to me. For the first time in my life I will have a decent salary that affords a lifestyle with more than just the basics. Choosing to become a tradesperson at almost exactly the same time as Alberta’s economic boom began was probably the best decision I’ve ever made. In addition to the personal satisfaction I get out of doing my job, it sure doesn’t hurt that we are in great demand right now. Although I’ve always been a person who thought that it was more important to love what you are doing than to make gobs of money, as I get older I realize that having a comfortable living is almost as important as loving what you do. When you have both together, it’s a real blessing.

So, getting older doesn’t seem like it’s a horrible thing. I don’t really mourn the passage of my youth. I look at the average lifespan of people now and realize that I’ve still got 40 plus years of living to experience...if I’m lucky, of course. I feel strong, confident and healthy. I have wonderful friends and family. With age comes the ability to recognize that the times of contentment are precious and important. In all, life is good and I’m happy.

Time, I embrace you. My birthday wish this year is that I try to slow down, make the most of every second available, and appreciate each one that I have.

And maybe, just maybe, to write more.

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Today’s Treasure: I had tea with my elderly neighbour. Although she’s 84, she has a young spirit and a big, generous heart. She has the most amazing, intelligent, sparkling blue eyes and a great sense of humour. I love her!

Eligible?

When women find out I’m an electrician, more often than not the first question they ask is either: “Did you do it to meet men?” or “Do you meet a lot of eligible men?” The answer to both questions is, “No.” I did it because I needed a change from sitting behind a desk all day, because I’ve always enjoyed working with my hands and because I get a kick out of doing unusual things.

I like men. In my life I have just as many close male friends as female ones. I’m very comfortable talking to and working with men. I also like men in “that” way, but to make a career choice based on the potential to meet men? Puh-leez. I suppose there are women out there who might make that choice, but I don’t think they’d last very long. Let me tell you, it ain’t a fashion show.

Most days are spent underneath the ugliest of hard hats and behind the nerdiest of safety glasses. Any make-up such a princess might choose to wear would be quickly sweated off or buried under layers of dust and dirt. Since most functional work pants are made for guys, they aren’t the most flattering to the female form. Footwear consists of clonky work boots day in and day out…enough to send any shoe diva screaming. Jewelry is a hazard when working with electricity. Hairstyles, if long, are boring ponytails or braids. Any shirt soon has holes from snagging on the sharp edges that abound on construction sites. Also, these sharp edges cause many gashes and scratches on exposed arms, leaving scars that make a girl look like she’s gone ten rounds with the pet cat from hell.

Of course, this assumes that the woman is actually trying to do the work and will get dirty, sweaty and bloody. I recently witnessed a chicklet on the jobsite who was happy to be there hanging out with the boys but who barely did any work. She was (supposedly) a framer, but spent more time giggling and standing around than she did working. She was quite attractive and the guys on my crew definitely noticed THAT right off the bat, but within a week or two they were referring to her as “The Beauty Queen” and commenting almost exclusively on how little she actually did during a day. Pretty soon, the boys were all atwitter with the gossip that she got fired. No one was really surprised.

Even if a gal is doing the job with legitimate motivations, there’s still the question about eligible men. Despite being single and surrounded by men on a daily basis, I’ve been too focused on doing a good job and learning the trade to pay more than cursory attention. It’s not that I haven’t noticed physically attractive men – c’mon, I’m a red-blooded female surrounded by hot, fit construction guys – it’s just that the opportunities to find out if there’s anything of substance beneath the muscles are few and far between. Any preliminary chat-while-you-work conversations usually lead to the discovery that the guy a) is married or in a relationship, b) is way too young or, c) has no substance. I guess if I was just interested in sex any available b) or c) would do, but those days are over and now I kind of prefer someone who can stimulate me mentally as well as physically. It’s not too much to ask that the guy has actually read a book in the past year, is it?

And then there’s me. I don’t think I’m exactly the type that appeals to construction workers, either. From sitting in on lunch conversations about their spouses and girlfriends, it seems that the overwhelming majority of these guys are quite traditional and take a bizarre kind of pride in having a woman who relies on them to do “manly” things. Oh, sure, they “complain” that their women don’t know how to check the air pressure in tires, don’t earn very much, if any, money yet spend lots on shoes, handbags and clothes to add to their already overflowing closets, and can’t undo a pickle jar without help (okay, that’s a wee exaggeration) but they all seem pretty happy with these women so there must be some kind of appeal. When I think about what I’m like in relation to those kinds of women, I often have a song from Annie, Get Your Gun running through my head:

I’m quick on the trigger
With targets not much bigger
Than a pinpoint, I’m number one
But my score with a feller
Is lower than a cellar
Oh, you can’t get a man with a gun

…or in my case, a Hilti gun.

Since my life is very much taken up by working long hours and being too tired to do much after work, the opportunities to meet men in other settings are pretty limited. So, for now I guess I can enjoy the eye candy that flits in and out of my field of vision during the day and hope than someday a single, interesting, educated and somewhat sophisticated guy who appreciates a self-sufficient woman will walk into my life. It could happen, right? Or, it might be easier to win the 6-49.

I think I’d better buy a ticket.

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Today’s Treasure: Frozen hamburger patties. Seriously. I came home tired and hungry and didn’t feel like cooking. Tossed ‘em on the BBQ right out of the freezer and, voila, instant supper. It’s the small things that make me happy sometimes.

Folk Fest Love Letter

I think I’ve finally recovered from sleep deprivation caused by my weekend at the Folk Fest. The festival is always one of the highlights of my summer and this year was no different. I love discovering new music, sitting on the hill and watching the night sky, writhing in the sea of humanity known as the dance area and just soaking up the general feeling of peace and relaxation that seems to take over the whole site. But the best thing about it is spending time with friends I love.

Eleven years ago I attended my first Folk Fest with Mike, Ed, Avrum, Donna, Brian, Judith and some other ball-playing friends. I knew nothing about how things worked but was soon educated with respect to tarp running, workshop attendance and socializing in the beer gardens.

I have amazing, wonderful, kind-hearted and generous-of-spirit friends. I’ve had the pleasure of attending Folk Fest with many of them and creating some great memories.

One year, I was walking to the site with my then-boyfriend when he noticed that he had lost his ticket. We started retracing our steps and met up with Avrum who had actually found the ticket quite a way back from where we met him…Another year, it poured rain on one night, so I huddled up on the hill with Avrum and Donna and we drank cinnamon schnapps to keep warm…Another year, Rich and I danced for hours in the pouring rain. We didn’t care, we had ponchos…Then there was the year that Su’s friend, Darlene and I lucked out and got into the first tarp group. We were about four tarps back from the stage and VERY popular that day…Roger has his own FF group, but he always makes a special guest appearance on our tarp…One of the really memorable years was the first one that Mike brought Su and Ed brought Jen. Unlike other females who came and went over the years, I could tell that these two were really special. Special enough that they married these lovely women two years later.

Our little group of friends has experienced beer garden shenanigans, been witness to a variety of each other’s relationship squabbles and watched the kids grow up and get bigger every year. We meet up with each other’s friends in the beer gardens and don’t see them again until the following year. Most friends come and go, depending upon what else they have going on in the summer, but the one person who is the constant for me is Mike.

In my mind, without Mike there is no Folk Fest. He was there at the beginning. He shares many of the same memories. He has been the ticket-procurer, tarp-runner and organizer extraordinaire for many Folk Fests. He has a heart the size of the universe and in the worst year of my life when I lost my job, my boyfriend and my sense of purpose within the span of a few weeks, he rallied my friends and they all pitched in for my ticket. So yeah, Mike is pretty important to my whole Folk Fest experience…and now Su, too, of course.

This year I got to share the festival experience with friends who attended for the first time. Thanks to some convincing by her Folk Fest cherry-busting buddy, Keith, Cookie dipped her geeky hippie toes into the lukewarm festival waters on Thursday night, then dove in completely with Dusty on Sunday. We all danced like crazy people for nearly two hours and engaged in general silliness. It was the first time we danced together, and from the amount of fun generated it’s hopefully not the last!

Another new friend I danced with for the first time was David. Ah, David. Normally, I wouldn’t think that slow dancing in the beer gardens with the guy drooling all over my shoulder would be a highlight, but David is special and it was his first time at the festival. I can forgive a little drool. After all, he’s only 4 months old. Last year he was sort of in attendance, but he didn’t get to see much and it wasn’t really easy to dance with him. This year, he got to see everything and be admired by one and all. If ever there was a kid that’s gonna grow up at the Folk Fest, it’s David. Incidentally, Mike and Su are pretty integral to his whole Folk Fest experience, too.

Ok, there’s this goofy little thing I started doing there. I knit little dishcloths. There’s a lot of time spent sitting around and listening to music. I like my hands to be occupied, so I knit. I like to think of it as symbolically knitting the music into the cloth. Then I give them to my friends so they can remember what fun we had at the festival. Crazy, huh?

To all of my wonderful friends who have shared my lovely Folk Fests for the past eleven years, I thank you. You’ve made every one of them special and memorable. And to those of you who haven’t been there with me yet, we will have to go. I can’t think of a better experience to share with the people who also share a special place in my heart.

I love you guys!

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Today’s Treasure: Blue-dee-doo the Fuzzeroo and I went for a walk in the ravine where I was delighted to find ripe Saskatoons, choke cherries and pin cherries. I was grooving to Michael Franti and eating the sun-warmed berries fresh off the bushes while Blue did his doggy rounds. We also visited our favourite look-out point on that path and sat communing with nature for a while. Sometimes all the elements just come together and create a few precious minutes of pure bliss.

On Call

I hate cell phones. I’ve hated them for a while, but my hatred has been taken to a higher level this week by what seems to be a disturbing new trend. Bald guys wearing those little earpiece thingies. I mean…seriously. Who do they think they are? Captain Picard?

Now, I don’t care if a guy has hair or not. Earpiece thingies are equal opportunity idiot makers. I only mention the bald thing because “Picard wannabes” was the first image I got when I saw them. I’m not a big Star Trek fan. Did Picard even ever wear something so stupid hanging off the side of his head? My gut says no, that he had the sci-fi chest communication thingy, but I could be wrong.

Anyway, equal opportunity idiot makers. The guys without hair look like they’re trying to be Picard. At least it’s pretty obvious that they’re talking on the phone because it’s extremely noticeable on the side of their bald heads. The guys with hair walk around looking like they’re talking to themselves and should be given a wide berth. You can’t really tell they’re on the phone unless you look carefully. And who wants to look carefully at a madman? That just spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E.

This is just the latest in my ever-growing list of reasons to hate cell phones. But I have many others.

First off, is anyone really that important that they need to be in contact with others 24/7? Ok, maybe if you’re a doctor or other people’s lives are depending on you a cell is necessary, but for the vast majority of warm bodies out there it’s just an annoying and rude little toy that mistakenly elevates the sense of self-importance. People think that the world will fall apart if they can’t be reached by phone. Newsflash: It won’t.

Manners have gone by the wayside where cell phones are concerned. I recently went out on a first date with a perfectly nice fella who seemed alright until he answered his cell phone and yakked for a good ten minutes to the guy on the other end about almost nothing while I stood around trying not to eavesdrop. It wasn’t an “escape-route-in-case-this-first-date-sucks” call because he wanted to hang around with me for another couple of hours but also took another 5-10 minute call during that time. These weren’t “I’m-so-busy-and-important-I-can’t-be-away-from-a-phone” calls, either. They were more “I-have-a-cell-phone-and-I’m-afraid-to-miss-any-call, even-the-ones-from-phone-solicitors” calls. It didn’t make a great first impression on me and pretty much tarnished his appeal from the get-go. Dating tip for dummies: Shut it off. (guys and girls!)

You can’t have dinner in a restaurant without some annoying ring tone going off or someone yakking while waiting for friends. Although most people turn off the ringer in movie theatres, they still peek at their phones if they vibrate to see who’s calling and the annoying little screens shine away in the dark. Going to the movies is supposed to be about ESCAPISM. How can you frickin’ well escape if you are a slave to your phone? And speaking of slavery, don’t get me started on text messaging…the decline of proper spelling, people hunched over their little screens and keypads…illiteracy and physical abuse…sure sounds like slavery to me. Liberate yourselves, people!

I recently read Stephen King’s book, “Cell”, in which an insidious signal is broadcast via cell phones and everyone who has one becomes a raging zombie. Only a few phoneless people escape and the future of normal people depends on them. Amen, brother!

I think my hatred of cell phones is rooted in my past. Years of answering phones on the job. At that time, I would hate the sound of a ringing phone when I went home because I was tired of answering it. In addition, it was often just my workaholic boss phoning me for some minor thing that could have waited until then next day but because he thought of it at that precise moment, he had to call me. When call display came along it was a great invention and I still love it. The same goes for voice mail. These are phone tools that allow me to decide if I’m available on the phone or not.

And that’s the crux of the matter. I don’t like the assumption cell phones create that I’m at the beck and call of anyone who wants to dial my number.

Surprisingly, I do actually own a cell phone. I load it up with a paltry amount of minutes every couple of months. I keep it in the car. I have it for emergencies or for my convenience. I only turn it on when I want to use it or if I’m waiting for a call from friends. It’s a tool and I use it when it’s useful and necessary to me. I use lots of tools everyday. I don’t carry a screwdriver with me into stores and everywhere else just in case a screwdriver emergency arises, but when I need one I have one available. The same goes for the cell phone. My beef is not with the tool itself, but with the tools users.

Whoops, gotta run. My screwdriver just rang.

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Today’s Treasure: Actually, it’s a weekend treasure. My friend Wayne was home from Toronto and passed through town. He, his mom and I had Friday dinner & a movie and Saturday lunch. The two of them picked Saskatoon berries earlier in the week and brought me a bucketful. Time spent with friends is very precious, especially when they live far away.

Wildlife Sightings

Today I saw the biggest mouse I have ever seen in my life. I was on a scissor lift about 30 feet in the air and it was running on the ground. In most places, you would assume it was a rat. Here in rat-patrolled Alberta, it’s just a giant mouse. From the air it looked to be at least four inches long, not including tail. Ironically, we’re building a multiplex and I sighted Mickey while piping one of the movie theatres. Maybe he’s scouting new screening locations.

Mickey is not the only wildlife I’ve seen while on the job. I’ve been acquainted with several of his cousins on various sites. Sometimes I see the family, sometimes I just see the little “presents” they leave behind. That’s especially nice when opening a ceiling tile and having a little scattering of presents rain down. Good thing I’ve got a hard hat.

Often birds get into the buildings because so much of it is open at the beginning of construction. There have been a few birds flying in our current building. Last week when I was on a lift I saw the beginnings of a nest built on top of some ductwork. It kinda reminded me of a line from Jurassic Park, “Life finds a way”.

In my first year I worked up in Fort McMurray sporadically and there were often wildlife sightings on the way up there. Deer, foxes and even Wyle E. Coyote, who had given up on Roadrunner hunting and dined out of the camp dumpsters on a regular basis.

This past spring I was working on a rooftop and heard Canada geese honking. I looked up and they were coming in for a landing, flying maybe ten feet above my head. They were so close I could hear their wings beating. They landed on a frozen puddle in the parking lot next to my building and stayed there for at least an hour, breaking the ice, drinking and resting. It was amazing to be that near them while they were still in flight. They didn’t seem to know I was there and were just doing what came naturally to them.

But, my most interesting wildlife sightings are of the two-legged variety.

I was working with a journeyman to wire up the CDI College sign on the side of the building beside the Hotel MacDonald. We had to get a big boom lift in order to get up there and I was waiting to flag down the delivery truck while he was organizing stuff. Since it was first thing in the morning on Jasper Ave., there were lots of pedestrians. I was just standing there waiting and this one strange looking guy came along and started talking to me.

Guy: Do you know the difference between flesh and plastic?

Me: No.

Guy: Well, plastic is hard and cold and flesh is warm and soft. I can satisfy you or any woman with my warm, soft flesh.

Me: Okay, go away now.

Guy: I didn’t mean to offend you. I just wanted to know if you knew the difference between flesh and plastic.

And off he went on his merry way.

At the end of that day I waited for the truck to come and pick up the lift again. I waited nearly 3 hours and was getting pretty annoyed. At about hour 2 another strange guy came along. This one didn’t look weird, just a student with a backpack, so it caught me off guard when he pointed his finger at me and started making phaser-shooting sounds.

Buck Rogers stood there for at least 30 seconds phasering me. I was trying to ignore him – didn’t want to provoke the wildlife, doncha know – but he wouldn’t stop. Some pedestrians walked by and looked at us like we were both crazy. I just gave ‘em the “your guess is as good as mine” shrug.

Finally, after the 30 seconds or so, I told him to go away. He decided he was going to take one of my traffic cones with him. I decided he wasn’t.

He leaned down to pick it up. I stomped on the corners of it with my boots and told him to go away again.

He moved to the next one, picked it up and carried it like a baby. I snatched it away from him and told him to get lost.

He walked half a block, turned around and started screaming, yelling and shaking his fists. I couldn’t hear what he said over the traffic noise but his body language was loud and clear. Finally, he resumed walking away and as a parting shot he gave me the double finger. Ouch, that really hurt my feelings.

No wonder they warn people about getting too close to wildlife.

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Today’s Treasure: As I was driving home I saw an old-time mobster car pulled over on the side of the highway. It was in pristine condition and looked like it had just rolled off the lot. There was nobody around and I half expected to see Capone and gang come walking out of the tree-line, wiping the dirt off their hands. Hey ya mugs! Whaddya doin’ in there?

I have a rich fantasy life.

Playing With Boys

After 2 ½ years of working with all guys all the time, this week I officially became “one of the boys”.

In truth, I’ve mostly felt like one of the guys for a long time now. They feel comfortable enough around me to engage in general “guy” behaviour and know I’m not going to react like a prissy schoolmarm. Belching, farting, swearing…I’ve become immune to all of it. Talking about women in the many and various ways they do…I don’t even bat an eyelash anymore. Making silly double-entendre jokes about sex…Honey, my mind’s right there in the gutter with ‘em. But one thing was missing to make me feel completely accepted. The practical joke.

Over the years I’ve watched them play tons of pranks on each other. I’ve seen “The Great Tool Hunt” where one guy tied a tool to an overhead pipe in our lunch area and waited days to see how long it took the owner to find it. Meanwhile the rest of the crew knew it was there and snickered to each other every time the owner mentioned the loss.

Then, there was “The Great Sandwich Caper”. “Bob” wanted “Chuck” to get him a sandwich since Chuck was making the trip to the restaurant anyway. Bob didn’t give quite enough money to cover the cost, so Chuck took a bite out of the sandwich, then wrapped it back up and delivered it to Bob...who shrugged and ate it anyway.

And, although I didn’t see this one, “Chalked Hardhat” is a legendary tale of the time one guy put blue chalk dust in another guy’s upturned hardhat. When “Hatless” put his hat back on, he was covered with chalk. He went home to have a shower, but the addition of water to the dust turned it into a blue dye. He came back to work looking like a Smurf.

I’ve been amused by these tales and pranks, but I’ve always felt that there was a bit of separation in their minds between what they would do to each other and what they would do to me. Like they were scared of doing something that might make me cry…or they were just being nicer to me than to each other. Although no one likes to be the brunt of jokes, it builds camaraderie in a strange way and makes work fun. In this respect, I felt kinda like the kid who always gets picked last.

This week all that changed.

I was doing several installations and I thought my foreman told me to install them horizontally. I remember thinking that it was weird because generally this item is installed vertically, however on the odd occasion it goes in horizontally. I put in a couple horizontally, then my foreman called me on it and told me to put them in vertically. I was convinced that he had said horizontally, so I grumbled about it then changed it.

The next day, one of them was still horizontal and I was sure I had changed it. He called me on it and complained that I didn’t know the difference between horizontal and vertical – which I obviously do – and I was incensed because I only put it horizontally in the first place because I thought he told me to do it. I didn’t have the proper screwdriver on me at the time, so I borrowed one from a co-worker who was standing right there and changed it. I thought perhaps I had just missed that one the day before.

A couple of hours later, he called me again and complained that I hadn’t fixed the installation because it was still in the horizontal position. Since he is also known for teasing people and jerking their chains, I thought he was just trying to tease me about not knowing the difference between horizontal and vertical, but he wasn’t and was quite ticked off. I told him that I changed it that morning as soon as he had pointed it out and I called on my co-worker to back me up, which he did. So, then we knew someone was playing a joke on us.

Later that afternoon, another one of my co-workers ‘fessed up that he had switched the position…TWICE. Jerk! We laughed hysterically, especially when he was describing how cranky I got when I had to change it. I think he wasn’t sure how I would take it when he told me, but was willing to give it a shot for the fun of it. Bless his cotton socks! So, although I was cranky while I was changing the freakin’ installations three times, the humor of it afterwards more than made up for it.

I’m sure he has no idea what a gift this first prank was to me. I now officially feel like one of the boys. I will always be grateful that he had the guts to try it.

Still…I owe him one.

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Today’s Treasure: Went to visit Mike, Su and 4-month-old David. Baby giggles and snuggles are the absolute best way to appreciate and live in the moment. Also, amazing lightning show tonight. I love it when the night is lit up like the day for a fleeting second and everything is bathed in that electric silver light. Another great reminder about living in the moment.

Luddites Need Love, Too

Sometimes I bewilder myself.

I’m a self-confessed Luddite. I have a circa 1997 computer, dial-up Internet and an intense dislike of cell phones. I don’t check my email every day…sometimes not even every week. I don’t know how to download photos from a digital camera to my computer. I still buy CDs and play them on my Sony Discman. My TV is a whopping 15” and I won it at a 1987 Christmas party. I have rabbit ears, not cable. In my world, text messaging means writing a note on a piece of scrap paper, blackberries are tasty and make good jam, and ipods are what science fiction aliens use to launch themselves from the mothership.

Why in the world would I want to have a blog?

Point the finger at Cookie. Because she’s writing regularly. Because she’s a good writer. Because she entertains me. Because she made me realize how much I miss writing. Because I want to prime the pump again and have a reason to do it. Because I have lots of thoughts and want to explore them. Just because.

Despite the fact that I’m something of an old-fashioned girl who can knit, crochet, make jelly, bake bread from scratch, identify most edible berries in the woods and who doesn’t give a fig about technology, I’m ultra-modern in one pretty significant way. I’m a female electrician. Yep, only 3-5% of electricians in this province need to sit down to pee (more on that in future posts).

Electrician: I’m handy with power tools. I’d rather shop at Home Depot than The Gap. I get to build stuff. I get to destroy stuff. I get to be dirty most of the time. I go clomping around wearing boots like Gaston (50 points if you can name that song). I play with boys everyday. I lift and carry heavy stuff. I know how to wire things and not get electrocuted.

Female: I like pretty, shiny things. I wear dresses when I’m not at work. I enjoy looking at men. I eat with clean hands. I am the lone female privy to the day-to-day thoughts and conversations of a bunch of guys.

I figure the juxtaposition of the two gives me a few things to talk about on this here ole Internet blog thingy.

So, welcome. Hope you find something here to interest and amuse you.

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Today’s Treasure: I happened to be in Starbucks and had a gift certificate. I don’t normally like that store, but I felt like a frozen drink and, hey, it was free. I tried an Orange Mocha Frappacino. Mmmm! Yummy! Definitely worth repeating. Thank goodness for gift certificates!