Write It Down

During the week, I have tons of great ideas for this blog. I see something and think, yeah! I will write about that!! Or have a conversation that really inspires me, and I think I can help others too! Then Saturday or Sunday rolls around, when I actually have the time to sit down and pour my heart into an awe-inspiring experience, and I have no idea what those thoughts were all week long. It’s just gone. I do think about writing it down, but what I know about me, is that those pieces of paper with the notes would be sitting at my desk at the office, or be lost and gone forever in my pile of crap I keep on what is supposed to be my kitchen table. So a lot of days, you get what you get here from me, off the cuff.

I spend my time at work talking on the phone, mostly. The calls are supposed to be fairly cut and dry: What’s up with your roof, and where do you live and how do we contact you. It’s all put right out there for us. Keep it short, professional, and friendly without going off the rails. Yep, I go off the rails more often than not. I can’t help it. As much as I bitched about people in my restaurant days, I do truly like them and I am interested in helping them and knowing about them. My calls should be about 2 minutes, give or take, but a lot of the time I end up at 4-5 minutes, or occasionally (or daily, whatever) I will have a call that goes 10 or more minutes. Oops. I get people laughing.

I had a guy about a week or so ago call for an estimate. It starts normal, short information about his situation, and I get the information. He gives me his address, and he happens to live on Easy Street, in Green Bay. As you can imagine, that was too much for me. Off the rails. But I had him laughing, I am sure he has had the comments about living on easy street before he ever thought his roof needed our love. But none of those comments were from me. I may have heard him snort, he was chuckling so hard. I can’t even tell you much of what I actually said, but it was pure gold. Not sure if he bought a roof from us, but his life on Easy Street will never be the same.

This is what I have to do to keep this job engaging for me. I don’t know the construction industry, I know how to make drinks and serve the food, and cook it if I have to. This transition has been a real challenge. I have discussed it before. But now I am more than a year into it. I know more of my co-workers better, I am in the routine of working normal people hours, and I know my personality can be an asset to the company, as long as I keep it relatively clean. I can also speak roof-talk a little. When people call and explain, I can use the roof words a little bit. Box vents, pipe vents, valley, soffit, fascia. Yep, even know what some of them are. We won’t go into my lack of computer knowledge, but I have learned to cut and paste, and I can transfer pictures from one thing to another. Old dogs, new tricks.

It’s tough to change things, especially when it’s kind of a forced thing due to circumstances like a pandemic. I had wondered for years if I would ever find an exit strategy from the restaurant industry. The strategy found me, more or less. I was lucky beyond words that the things came along that did. I have people tell me that luck wasn’t it, that my personality and work ethic made it easy for people to want to help me out. Maybe, but timing and luck are a part of it. I am thankful, and I will continue to count my lucky stars that things have worked out.

Don’t be afraid of the changes, they are going to happen if you hang around long enough. A lot of people are in a rut, without even knowing it, and if that rut is working for you, stick it out, but don’t be afraid of the changing wind direction. While I was going through it, I marveled at myself for not freaking out more. I was so worried, but I didn’t let that get to me too much. I am glad I stuck with it long enough to have a conversation with the guy living on Easy Street. And I know I can still have an impact on people in a fun, positive way without having to ply them with tequila.