Should I go into construction?

This week has been a major week of moving and studio building. Lots of wood cutting, measuring, dry-walling, insulating, and messing up so that I can do it all over again. The cool thing is that I’m finding that I look so dang good in safety glasses that maybe I should go into construction anyway and forget this whole music business thing. That’s pretty much what I’ve been doing all week. Zero hours of music and long hours of construction. I’ll be blogging later about some specs on what I worked on for those who are into studio stuff.

Meanwhile, I thought I would bring attention to the heart-beat behind my success in life and music. Especially in the spirit of father’s day, I must say that I would not be where I am today without my parents. Despite the fact that I would have had difficulty coming into the world without them, they have been my support through every stage of the game. Even as I am a grown adult now, they are determined to give and serve with every bit of energy they have.

I moved into my new place and studio last week, and my dad mentioned that he and mom wanted to come help us get settled. So for 3 days straight they came and helped do all the grunt work. My dad helped me do all the construction and woodwork stuff. He brought his fun toys and woodworking gadgets out. There was a moment as we worked that he paused and said something like, “Hey, this is really neat that we can do this now. We couldn’t do this when you were young.” I asked him why not. He said, “Because back then I was too particular to get it perfect and you were too impatient to try.”

It’s funny, I’d like to think we met in the middle. That he eased up a bit on the perfection and I grew a bit more of an attention span. But I think that was just his nice way of saying that I’ve grown.

My mom is the arch-nemesis of weeds. My dad and I kept telling her to stop so she wouldn’t die of heat stroke and we get charged for domestic labor slavery, but she insisted on breaking her back over the weed infested yard.

So for those in my past who have ever thought even for a second that I possibly was a jerk, you can be justified now in light of the fact that I have put my 63 year old parents to manual labor without pay for 3 days (it’s true they are 63). This however is a perfect example of parents going over the top. I wonder daily how I can give back to such loving parents. I have the feeling that the only true way to attempt that is to somehow strive to love others the way they do…maybe someday one of my own.