Wednesday. Half way through the week already, and I've only been back at the office for one day. That feels weird; I'm worried about my stamina for this week, though, since it will be so hot, so I'm kinda glad the week is already half way over.
I had some trouble waking up this morning. I shot up to my alarm but I closed my eyes for a minute. At least I thought it was a minute. I ended up sleeping for another 15min which was so weird because it didn't feel like that much time had passed.
I must have been really slow this morning because everything I did took longer than I thought it would, and before I knew it, it was 7:45am. I still had things to get together! Crazy. But I made it to work about 5min after 8am, which is good considering we don't even get started until at least 8:30am every day.
By about 8:30am, everything got started. There were two jobs available-- finishing the project at the Rosebud Dam or putting up barricades at the school where a Youth Appreciation day was being held. Since I had worked with the guys on the dam yesterday, I quickly picked the dam.
Before we headed to the dam, we had to run over to Rosebud Building Products, because, as you might recall, we ran out of materials in the middle of construction yesterday. We picked up the wood (16 footers), and loaded it onto an 8ft truck bed. Pretty janky. But funny. One of the guys from the crew I was with was worried about there being a flag or something on the wood, since it was sticking out so far, but then he was like "Well I guess it's the Rez so it don't matter." Classic Ferg.
We ended up doing a lot of running around today more than actual work, but I enjoyed today so much. Throughout the entire day, I made it a point to try to get to know Ferg and Ernie a little more than I already did. I talked to them a lot about their job, how they felt about management, why they did what they did, what they thought about their coworkers, and a bunch of other stuff. Super solid conversations. I really did learn a lot about them, their character, and the pride they take in the work they do at the office. I loved seeing that in them: pride in their work.
When we ran out to the dam this afternoon, the boat had been moved by the office that we were borrowing it from, and all the administration was gone, so that was a no-go. When we got back to the office, it turns out we had a shed that needed to be built, so we spent quite a while loading a couple hundred pounds of wood into our truck.
Guess what happened when we were about halfway through loading everything up? We ran out of materials. At that point, I found it kind of ironic that I had worked three different jobs with this office and in the middle of each job I had worked, we ran out of materials.
In the middle of the fencing project (that still wasn't finished), we had to quit because we ran out of fence; in the middle of the Rosebud Dam project, we had to quit because we ran out of floor boards; in the middle of loading the truck, before we even started the shed project, we ran out of materials for the floor boards. Weird. But it's a wonderful lesson for me to learn! I'm really glad this stuff has been happening so I can witness first-hand that kind of stuff that goes on in a business like the Employment Training program.
We ended up finding something to make the floor work, so after a couple hours, we were able to take all of that out to the site just south of Mission. We unloaded everything quicker than we had loaded it because more guys showed up, then Percy (the new carpenter) started working on the base/floor of the shed. We asked him if he wanted our help, but he wanted to prove himself since he was new. We'll help him tomorrow.
On our way back, we hit up PJ's Pizza. I asked Ernie and Ferg if they wanted me to grab them some food, because they bought me lunch yesterday, but not only did they say it was cool that I didn't pay them back, they also offered to buy me a pop! I was telling this to Greg and he said that was cool, cause he said that usually means that somebody respects you out here. That would be sweet.
After PJ's Pizza, wee ran around a little more, then I started to make my way back home around 5:30pm. I ended up staying late, because there were still guys around, and I was enjoying my time getting to know them so much that I wanted to stick around as long as possible. I can only pray for more days like today.
When I got back, I grabbed dinner quick, then Greg and I took Emily J.'s car down to his garage to fix her brakes. Everything went pretty smoothly. That was really nice, because the fun stops when stupid things go wrong.
When we got back from Greg's garage, it was around 9pm. Where did the day go!? I don't know, but it was a crazy awesome day. Can't wait to see what tomorrow holds!
Thanks for reading!
God bless,
Brenden
Things I learned today:
1. There is a pop station on the Rosebud Reservation! It took me a month to find it, but 94.7 is THE pop station of the area. Solid.
2. Nickson is a crazy dude. I think its a good thing. He's a business man in a world where I haven't been able to find many, but he needs to learn to listen to his crew.
3. Jeremiah 1:8
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