A Day In The Life Of A Stone Fabricator

A Day In The Life Of A Stone Fabricator

I’m sitting on the edge of the bed, wondering how a cat like me ever got into a situation like this, but I ain’t complainin’.   Who knew a celebrity of such stature would ever be into ol’ Dave?  I mean, Natalie Portman, of all people, here with ME!  I’m thinkin’ I must be more charming than I once thought as I dive into the liquid lust of those dilated pupils.  She’s high on me, and she’s so starved I can smell it.  The sparkling ozone on the surface of her craven eyes draws me in and at once I know exactly what she wants.  She steps forward.  Biting my lip in a most mischievous manner, I slooowly unzip her jeans and slip a finger into one of the belt loops as I give it a gentle tug.  Eyes locked in mine, she lets out a whisper of need as the tight denim falls to the “AND IT’S EXPECTED TO FALL TO MINUS FIFTY TWO TODAY AS WINDS FROM THE NORTHEAST WILL BE GUSTING THROUGH THE METRO AREA AT SPEEDS OF UP TO FIFTY KILOMETERS AN HOUR.”

Oh f**k me no! damn it all s**t! f**k! f**k! it’s the bloody radio alarm!  My desperate eyes scan the room around me, needing to see the thighs that will confirm my previous reality.  Sadly, Natalie is nowhere to be found.  In her place is a blaring weather report that is rendered pointless given the fact I have both a bedroom window and skin.  I should be a weather reporter, or a meteo-  whatever they’re called.  I would just tell people to look out the window and advise them that the weather outside is how it looks, and will stay pretty much the same until it starts looking a bit different.  “Thanks a lot, Mr. Radio Man,” I mumble to myself as I slowly awake and roll out of bed.  “I was just getting to the good part.”

Well, if I’m not havin’ a tumble in the rough with Miz Portman, at least I get to travel in the freezing cold and lift heavy things all day!  Golly, the anticipation of gruelling physical labour makes me harder than a priest at a playground, and I’m so excited to start my Monday that I nearly fall down the stairs after brushing my teeth and throwing on some work clothes.  Food and water for the cat?  Check.  Driver’s license, house keys, and some cash?  Check.  Work gloves and steel toed boots in bag?  Check.  

It’s time to greet the great outdoors, and as I notice that the windows of the front sun porch are completely frosted over a tiny little voice in the back of my mind starts telling me to call in sick and stay home.  “Don’t do it, David,” the voice warns.  “It’s minus a zillion out there and you don’t know what you’re getting into!  What if your first bus is late and misses the transfer to the second one?  You’ll be stranded. Left to die!  Remember Napoleon’s Russian campaign!  He thought he would make it.  Remember Hitler!”  

Wait.  

“I don’t wanna remember, Hitler, Brain!  That guy was an a*****e!  Stupid Brain,” I think to myself as I push open the door.  “Always trying to get me into trouble.”

But for once my brain was right.  As I walk against the wind towards my bus stop I realize I should have stayed home.  My skin confirms what my windows warned me about, and I think perhaps it’s time to stop mocking the weather report.  It’s colder than my ex girlfriend outside, and I’m starting to wonder if she might be around the corner freezing a Dave voodoo doll when I notice a prostitute approaching.  It’s quarter past seven in the A to tha M, and when I first moved to the area I used to think it was a strange time to see a lot of sex work activity, but as it turns out it’s a very lucrative hour.  This gal should recognize me, as our chats never end in a transaction, but this morning she must be more hard up than usual, and asks if I want a ‘date.’  I decline as my bus approaches, and I’m happy for the timing so I can make a graceful exit and enjoy the distraction of bus ads and passengers so I don’t have to dwell on the sadness of what just occurred.  

When I step on the bus I’m pleased to see it’s my regular driver, and she’s as delightfully polite and chipper as ever.  She beams me her usual radiant smile, and prints up a transfer for me without being asked to as she wishes me a great day.  I return the niceties as I secretly wonder what kind of drug she must be on to maintain such consistent civility.

Twenty-ish blocks later I’m stepping off the bus just in time to see the tail lights of my supposed second bus disappearing into the sunrise.  Damn it!  The transit website assures me I’ll have four minutes to spare between buses, yet my stats are sitting at about a 16% success rate for catching the bloody thing.  I will wait at this second bus stop for another twenty minutes, mentally willing my fingers and toes (and other parts too) not to fall off.  At some point I think I see the lights of a bus upon the horizon.  Could it be?  Or am I hallucinating?  It could be the lights of a semi or a dump truck.  Or I could have hypothermic shock.  Maybe I’m dead already.  

Hark!  It IS the bus!  I’m so happy I could cry.  But I won’t, because the tears would freeze to my face and burn my cheeks like liquid nitrogen.  As the bus slows and the front door opens I am unenthused to learn that the driver is the regular grumpy guy, and he’s as sullen and curt as ever.  He casts his usual scowl and rolls his eyes at my transfer as he lets out a sign.  I return the niceties as I secretly wonder what drugs he should be on to maintain some basic civility.  

Today I’m content to doze a bit during the second leg of my journey, even though this bus route passes through a college and collects cute byrds along the way like Rob Ford collects calories.  There’s a couple of folks I generally chat with, and one who I’m convinced has a thing for me, but today I’m too tired to carry a great conversation, and every cell and synapse seems focused on just thawing the f**k out.  Wake me up when Natalie Portman gets on.

Soon enough I’m at the last stop.  This bus doesn’t even go into the industrial park my shop is located in, but thankfully the company I work for is on the outer edge of the park, and is only a few minute’s walk from my stop.  Once more I brace the wind and marvel to myself that in a city with the topography of a pool table it can still feel like you’re hiking uphill.  

Eventually I see the hulking structure that houses Baroque Granite.  It’s one of those massive buildings that looks kinda like a strip mall, with a bunch of tenants smacked together side by side, but instead of catering to small establishments, this building hosts several businesses that each have a footprint the size of a grocery store.  I approach the behemoth, not minding at all that the imposing structure contains Work.  It also contains heat, and that is my primary concern right now.

I walk through the front doors and into the showroom, where I’m suddenly surrounded by gleaming rectangles of granite and marble, cut into sample sizes on the bridge saw, and then ground and polished in the shop before being displayed on the walls for customers to see.  I exchange a few pleasantries with the guys in the office off to the side, and hang up my jacket in the small staff kitchen before making my way to the shop in the back.  The shop is where the action happens, and today I’ll see what pieces of stone I still need to work on before I load ’em onto the a-frame in the truck and zip off to install them as a very expensive suburban kitchen. 

It looks like Tim, the installation sensation himself and my very own partner in crime, is almost done polishing a very large piece of stone.  The stone is a sink section, and it’s resting on a wooden table.  The table has a large space cut out of the centre, and Tim is standing “inside” the table in the middle of a hole in the stone where somebody’s sink will soon sit.  It’s an “under-mount” sink, which means that the sink will be attached underneath the stone, as opposed to “drop-in” sinks which have the steel or porcelain skirt resting visible above the countertop.  Because this sink will be attached underneath the stone with no skirt showing, we’ll have to polish the granite around the sink hole beautifully, as it will be highly visible above the steel bowls of the sink.  

Tim is in the middle of polishing the edges of the sink cut-out as he notices my entrance.  Tim is a good cat, and he’s easy to talk to and get along with.  We spend a lot of time in the shop working on stone together, and when it’s done we spend a lot of time in the work truck together delivering and installing said countertops.  It’s important that we have a good working relationship, and I’m happy we do.  I could have wound up installing kitchens with a dick.

Every day I walk in those doors of Baroque Granite I’m glad I’m not stuck working with Nikolai.  He’s exclusively a Shop Guy, because he can’t communicate with customers and I’m not entirely sure he’s allowed out in public.  Nikolai landed here from the Ukraine a couple of years ago, and I’m pretty certain the nation banded together and built a damn catapult to expel that m**********r.  Looking at his constantly-contorted face you’d almost wonder if he WAS catapulted into something.  He’s like a Slavic Grimace, and he acts like he’s under an oath of silence except for the random and unsettling times he chooses to let out a loud cackle before quickly becoming quiet again.  I’m under the distinct impression that his country doesn’t want him back.

As I’m chatting with Tim about the layout of the kitchen we’re about to install in somebody’s home I can feel Nikolai a few feet away, staring at us intently.  I cast a wary glance over my shoulder, and sure enough, that creepy cat is just….  Standing there.  Not working.  Not even pretending to.  Just standing, listening to our speech and observing us.  If he wanted to learn English he should have just stuck with his night classes and switched to watching American movies, or at least Anglophone porn, or whatever he’s into.  His stoic observation temps me to start acting like a monkey in a cage, but I resist the urge to feed his imagination.  I just want to warm up, finish the pieces and load them onto the truck, and get outta Dodge and on the road to minimize my time with the creep in the background.

“And besides,” Tim continues to explain the layout of today’s kitchen, “Have you noticed the size of this f****n’ sink?”  I look down towards the hole he’s standing in, and agree that it is indeed a large sink cut-out.  

“Large?”  he retorts with incredulity, “It’s the biggest f****n’ thing I’ve ever seen!”

“You’re starting to sound like your girlfriend.” I can’t resist the jibe, ‘cause it’s this type of juvenile humour that wards off insanity during a stressful day of handling very expensive and very heavy product.  

Tim feigns a look of rage.  “Don’t crack wise with me, or it’ll be curtains for ya, see?”

“Nah, what’s the rumpus over your twist?  You can dangle in the wind, fella!”

“Why, you-s got a lotta moxie!”

“No guff, flat-foot!”

Tim is about to reply in hilarious Prohibition fashion when we notice Nikolai, eyes wild with baby-eatin’ frenzy, take an aggressive step forward.  I’m waiting for him to grunt out something vaguely condescending as I look into his incomprehensible eyes: two pools filled to the brim with the madness of a thousand massacres.  I briefly consider running in fear to gather the villagers, when at last he finally speaks:

“Fvat eez muuxie?” 

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[David Ellert]

This piece may turn into a series if my day job provides enough entertainment to write about. There's probably more chapters to come. Written in a couple hours after a particularly long work day.