it's like fight club ... but not
We finished up the Salvation Army work a little before lunch and stopped in a street fair near downtown Biloxi for gumbo and coffee; then we spent the rest of the afternoon gutting buildings. Interior work consists a large portion of Hands-On jobs. The houses with heavy damage need to be gutted and treated for mold damage before they can begin reconstruction; with gutting defined as taking out every part of the interior structure that is not load bearing. And I mean every part. We're given crowbars, sledgehammers and shovels and told to have at it.
I am reminded that human beings are tool using creatures and we are frighteningly effective with the right tools in our hands. With one crowbar, I demolished a closet in fifteen minutes, flipping the instrument around to swap leverage points and pry apart specific joins, shelves and frames. The savvier hands can do it in five, with a practiced, calm ease that belies the destructive nature of their efficiency. We are in our element in these situations; and it's work that I take to with a surprising degree of ease.
There's an almost disturbing amount of aggro in the efforts of some. There's a loud crash behind me, and one of my teammates, a twenty-four year old insurance analyst in "the real world", is laying into a kitchen counter with a sledgehammer. He has to return to his cubicle in two days, and already he's dreaming of excuses to stay on. A cathartic cry follows each of his swings as this decades old formica counter shatters into pieces that we shovel up and deposit into a pile outside the house. He says that he feels alive doing this kind of work. I imagine that it's like Fight Club, but without the anarchy; and there is something thrilling when you are given permission to flout the rules and destroy something with the tools that you're given.
The old woman who owns the place is sitting outside, in her Toyota Camry, watching us wreck her house without saying anything. She's already cleared out everything salvageable; but saying that something isn't salvageable doesn't mean that it won't be missed.
It's near the end of the job, I've almost finished destroying this woman's pantry, and she walks in saying, "I was wondering if ... oh ..." and she sees what's become of her kitchen, how the cabinets, sink and shelves have disappeared, and she can now see her living room and dining room through the skeletal remains of her walls.
There's a long pause when we all stop and slowly look at her. "Oh," she says finally, "nevermind then." She walks back to her car.
I am reminded that human beings are tool using creatures and we are frighteningly effective with the right tools in our hands. With one crowbar, I demolished a closet in fifteen minutes, flipping the instrument around to swap leverage points and pry apart specific joins, shelves and frames. The savvier hands can do it in five, with a practiced, calm ease that belies the destructive nature of their efficiency. We are in our element in these situations; and it's work that I take to with a surprising degree of ease.
There's an almost disturbing amount of aggro in the efforts of some. There's a loud crash behind me, and one of my teammates, a twenty-four year old insurance analyst in "the real world", is laying into a kitchen counter with a sledgehammer. He has to return to his cubicle in two days, and already he's dreaming of excuses to stay on. A cathartic cry follows each of his swings as this decades old formica counter shatters into pieces that we shovel up and deposit into a pile outside the house. He says that he feels alive doing this kind of work. I imagine that it's like Fight Club, but without the anarchy; and there is something thrilling when you are given permission to flout the rules and destroy something with the tools that you're given.
The old woman who owns the place is sitting outside, in her Toyota Camry, watching us wreck her house without saying anything. She's already cleared out everything salvageable; but saying that something isn't salvageable doesn't mean that it won't be missed.
It's near the end of the job, I've almost finished destroying this woman's pantry, and she walks in saying, "I was wondering if ... oh ..." and she sees what's become of her kitchen, how the cabinets, sink and shelves have disappeared, and she can now see her living room and dining room through the skeletal remains of her walls.
There's a long pause when we all stop and slowly look at her. "Oh," she says finally, "nevermind then." She walks back to her car.