Relative Beginnings 1: Big Bang

Chapter 2

I walked down First Avenue with the rest of the morning commuters. I loved my mile-long walk. Rain or shine, it gave me a chance to take in the city and the water views. I loved to people watch and would always wonder about each person or group I would see. Tourists, bankers, dot com tech dudes, homeless, couples... it all filled me up.

I would make my way through downtown, Pioneer Square and then just got into SoDo where I would turn left and go one more block to my pride and joy manufacturing facility. Actually, it wasn't much. The building was nondescript. It looked like it could be an office or an apartment building. I owned the one occupied part of the building while the other spaces had been vacant for several years. This part of Seattle wasn't too popular which is why I was able to lease at pretty low rates.

I fished out my keys and opened the glass door leading inside. I began flipping lights on the main factory floor. Most people had no idea I worked out of here. I liked it that way since I always had at least a few dozen guitars in work at any given time.

I was proud of the custom hand work of each guitar and the time my partner, Ian, and I would take to design each guitar to be special and unique. Not just in tone but in looks as well. We also had a few full-time workers and as many part-time workers to keep the guitars moving through the shop. I was pretty low-volume at this point since custom guitars (and especially custom composite guitars) were in fairly low demand. I was enjoying the joys of discovering new customers while not feeling the urgent push to build a large inventory. My dad would say I was missing the point of business.

"Well, there you are, Eth, just a wee bit late this morning are ye?" Ian came sauntering in to the shop wearing his typical flannel shirt, flip flops (despite my safety speeches) and shorts. His Scottish legs glowed in greeting.

"Uh, yeah, well... Doug was over and..."

Ian cut me off. "Doug? Say no more. I caught his fire show last night. I laughed so hard I fellow on my arse Oh that lad was fifty sheets into the ol' wind last night." Ian slapped his knee and gave a deep belly laugh.

"So I heard. Destroyed another guitar too. And he wants me to give him one from the shop," I trailed off and looked around the shop. "Are we going to be ready for another oven run tonight?"

"Aye. If all of our part timers get in to finish bagging this afternoon."

Ian was referring to the process of vacuum bagging a part before it goes in for cure. The treatment of the bag along with the vacuum allows the volatiles from the resin to escape so that the part does not end up becoming porous... or Swiss cheesy as Doug would say.

"Right. Yep, well I'll come down and help as well," as I started walking up the stairs to my office.

"Sure you will, boss. Even if you don't, we'll get it covered." I heard Ian take a swig of his coffee and start unlocking tool boxes.

I felt a little guilty walking up the stairs knowing that my days in the shop were getting less and less as I was focused on trying to grow the business. Phone calls with distributors, potential customers, marketing, planning the next quarter and looking at the current quarter. I had no idea what it took to run a business when I started out. I still don't.

I threw my bag onto the floor and woke up my Mac. A couple of clicks and my email came up showing the over three hundred unread emails. I was notoriously bad at replying to people over email and showed my age by preferring to talk on the phone. It gave the impression that I was busier than I actually was.

The only subject heading that caught my eye was a possible featured spot on a blog writer's page that I had heard of. Oh wait, he wanted me to pay to be featured. Figures. Free marketing was hard to come by these days.

I leaned back in my swivel chair and let out a deep sigh. In that moment I also took in the old, used smell of my grandfather's carved mahogany desk that Doug and I had struggled to carry upstairs. I smiled at the memory of Doug fake dropping the desk at every step. 'What an ass.'

My grandfather's desk was the last strong link I had to his memory.Even pictures of him weren't as powerful. One wiff of the aging desk and I was transported back to my childhood. Laughing when he put me in his tree out back. Sitting by his feet playing while he was neck deep in research. Enjoying the sweet smell of his pipe tobacco when he was in deep thought. He would sometimes look over at me and wink and then dive right back into scribbling onto new and crumpled bits of paper.

His desk would also remind me of how much I missed him. I wondered what he was up to on the spirit side. I wasn't sure if I believed in all of that jazz, but Jessica was helping me to rethink my pessimistic views on the afterlife. Especially my previous view that there was no God and that we just go blank when we die.

Her face would scrunch up and she would say, "That is so dark and negative, Ethan. I know you can't possibly believe in that nonsense."

It was fair to say that she was coaching and guilting me out of my negative perspective on life and the afterlife. I would often wonder how I allowed myself to get so negative after my grandfather was legally ruled as deceased. I thought how cruel. Why would a God allow such a wonderful man to disappear and not say goodbye to his family. To me. What utter bullshit.

I blew out another sigh, ran my finger gently around the fleur-de-lis carvings and decided to make good on my word and head down to the shop to get my hands dirty.

In just the few minutes of being downstairs, Ian and all of our workers had come in. Even the part-timers. I was ashamed to say that I did not know all of the part-timers since Ian was the one who hired them and trained them. They all gave me a friendly wave and returned back to their tasks.

Ian saddled up beside me. "You're not thinking about sanding any of the body's again, arr ye?" Ian had a twinkle in his eye.

He was referring to the last guitar body that I pretty much fudged up and had to scrap. He would remind me, often, that I was a bossman now and that I should let the professionals do the manufacturing work. I felt my ego bruise every time he mentioned it since I always prided myself on being good with my hands. But I had to admit, it was easy for me to get distracted in the shop these days. Although that particular instance I believe I was thinking about the way Jessica places her index finger in her mouth when she listens to me talk. About anything. It drove me crazy. It also drove me crazy that I was a frightened little rabbit to tell her that.

"See. There you go again. You got that distant look in your eyes like you're a billion miles away from 'ere." I'd trust you to layup and bag. That's about it, ok Mr. Bossman?"

"Uh yeah, sure, Ian. Thanks for keeping quality job one." My face flushed and I walked over to the used ply cutting table we had installed recently. "We're making dreadnaughts today?"

"Mmmm. Yep. You remember the program number?" Ian was referring to the Numerical Control (NC) program file that would cut all of the ply shapes out.

"Yeah. Dread-naughty two, right?"

Ian's grin went wide. "That's the one, lad." He started whistling as he went back to polishing a cure mold.

I laughed to myself. Ian and Doug shared a lot in common. Their sense of humor was uncannily similar. Sighing, I turned around with my shoulders slightly slumped in defeat and trudged up the stairs to my office noticing that a lot of dust had built up along the outer edges of each step. I reminded myself to let the cleaning crew know they were getting sloppy.