In the Yard

The waiting is the hardest part, or so said Tom Petty. But it feels like we've already been on a journey. It feels like we've spoken about this for a long time, and we have. And apropos of that fact, I shared a breakfast with my son yesterday at Big Ed's North. More on this place later; the point being that I shared with him a deep and powerful secret of life as we consumed grits and other Southern breakfast foods.

"If you want to accomplish anything," I said, "talk about it." He looked at me in that special way. That way that says, Dad, you're a doofus.

"No, really." I continued, "Tell everyone. Talk about it non-stop. Even if you don't have the means or the way. Even talk about it to yourself... 'How do I get this started?' 'What would it take to get this going?' 'I'm going to ______.' The more you talk or write about it, the more likely it is to happen."

I shared with him that when his mother and I were first married and having kids, we were very poor -in an American way. Meaning that we had a large three bedroom apartment, two cars, but not much money. The cars were older and prone to breaking down. The apartment was rent controlled-section 8. Our kitchen table was part of an outdoor patio set we snagged. And yet, my beautiful bride, his mother, wanted a house with a yard for her children.

I did moonlight and worked extra jobs. Architect intern by day, and bartender by night. Or, later, project architect by day (not registered), rural newspaper delivery over 60 or 70 miles by early-early day (every single day), and moonlighting as an architect evenings and weekends. But that was later on, and by that time we had a house.

We talked about it incessantly. The house, that is. We searched high and low. But we didn't have money for a down payment. We didn't have this. And we certainly didn't have that. And what if that happened to this. Or worse, this happened to that. Unfortunately, we spent a lot of time on nonexistent options and fears.

​Eventually we just talked about what we wanted. Finally things started to congeal. And then one fine day, we went to a closing where I wrote a check for the grand total of $18. Yep, that's not a typo, eighteen dollars. And suddenly we had a home in need of quite a bit of work. And we had a nice mortgage payment to make every month in lieu of rent. And the kids had a nice yard to play in.

And so it goes with this trip. We've talked about it and talked about it and talked about it. And now, all of a sudden, we're ordering Go Pro cameras while digging up the Canon EOS rebel that we have someplace in the house. My son, the film major, is talking about mounts for the cameras. He's talking about a documentary. He's talking about POV (point of view). And he is doing so even though he has a little bit of a disdain for the Go Pro cameras. He's telling his filmmaking buddies that he might've found some cameras they can use after this trip is done -they're not professional grade, but they'll do. And he is waiting anxiously for these less-than-desirable cameras to arrive. They are all incredibly passionate about their craft and their future. Being young and poor, he just wants to make movies with his friends.

They just want a yard that they can play in.

Stay tuned.