So my new job has taken an interesting turn. I am now helping to complete construction on a beach house that is already rented for the weekend after next… punch lists and deliveries and schedules and the last minute tweaking of home goods… I am actually qualified to do this. Not the real work, like grouting or electrical wiring or the laying of sod, but I do know how to manage people who wear tool belts.
I have always had a thing for tool belts…
Yesterday the yard dudes laid grass and planted palm trees and created a beautiful, green lawn where there was only scrub and scattered beach sand: God’s work in 100 degree heat. The irrigation guys devised intricate patterns of sprinkler heads, shooting water just so – the newest and most vulnerable plants would receive lifesaving, fresh water in a heat wave.
Then the water stopped. As in there was no water. And the owner, who heard about this from lands far away (but was a little behind the proverbial eight ball of the crackerjack sod layers), said, “Well just make sure they don’t lay the sod until the water is fixed…”
Because I am nothing if not resourceful (and good at lying) I said, “It is already laid sir, but it’s about to rain here,” as I looked up at a sky so blue, poems could have been written about it.
And then I hung up and did what all desperate people do – especially when they are grateful, sober types with a newfound/rekindled relationship to God. I beseeched the azure heavens, “Please God. I won’t ask for anything else for a long, long time. I promise. Please make it rain…”
Aesop and Benjamin Franklin said, “God helps those who help themselves.” I would have been better off at the Winn-Dixie, buying all their bottled water or negotiating with the neighbors to run a hose across the no-man’s land between properties, boasting sea spurs and a twelve foot drop-off. For some reason, the foreman did not seem as concerned as me – he blithely informed me the water guys would be there in a day or so – while I aged five years trying to remember if I knew anybody in the waterworks department or the mayor’s office…
It did rain. The plants are fine. I do not think my prayers are the reason.
Two weeks from now, I envision myself lighting candles and plumping pillows hours before the renters arrive, spraying the air with Tai Dragon Fruit Fabreeze, wearing something white linen, placing a decorative pen beside a guestbook with an embossed shell on the cover…
Coming together nicely…
When in fact I will probably be on my knees assembling a trundle bed or on a roof untangling cable TV wires or calling the hot tub specialist because somehow a small alligator got in there!!
Shit happens. I’m ready for it these days.
And God helps those who help themselves, right?
Today I’m not drinking because I have deliveries.
