day labor, 60 pound jackhammer, thoughts

ultrasonic ringtones are neat because most people can't hear them. Two years ago, I could still hear tones in the 14K+ range. Now, I'm fifty, and I've discovered I cut off around 8K. That means that ultrasonics used to run teenagers off of spaces in the mall don't work on me (but they aren't aimed at me anyway), but it also means that instead of putting her cell phone on silent, my daughter can just use an ultrasonic ringtone and I won't hear it or be bothered. The same is true of most of the people who teach her in school. A 22K ringtone is one she can hear and none of the "adults" can.

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Ok, on to the topic I was going to blog about.

As my parents continue to work on their house, we had to take out all the flowerbeds. One, they were already pretty much out (except for the bottom layer of bricks and the concrete footer), Two, the dirt had to be lowered to keep the termites from coming back.

I'm not sure who it was that decided that a 16" footer was necessary. But that means a jackhammer and a wheelbarrow.

After a day of that, someone at church mentioned the day labor station in town. Legal workers, at $8.00 an hour, who work very, very hard. We paid them more, and a tip, and fed them, and felt they earned all of their pay. They also ran that jackhammer faster than I had.

I appreciate that illegal labor gets talked about a lot, but it made me feel very humbled to meet such hardworking legal workers, two of many lined up for work, eager to work very hard for not very much.

This weekend I just moved a lot of bricks and other trash to the trash pile. Win mudded walls, installed cabinets and laid tile. A friend said I'd better watch out or a fiery chariot would be showing up to take her to heaven while we all stayed behind. My parents are grateful for her efforts and I'm impressed.

I'll blog more later, just have been very busy.