Speaking of Ben...

A couple of years ago, a guidance councilor from a local junior/senior high school called my office and asked for some help.  The school was having a career day for their eighth grade class, and it was this person's job to line up speakers for the morning.  She explained to me that the goal of the school was to provide the kids with an understanding what different career paths they could take.  She was wondering if I would be willing to come in and give a short speech about the building trades, and what opportunities they presented as a career choice.

As she was giving me the hard sell as to why it would be great if I would agree to it, my mind began to wonder what other professions would be speaking that day.  "Mmmm...uh, huh", I kept saying as I was not listening to the sales pitch, all the while picturing doctors, lawyers, astronauts, and great actors such as Ben Affleck speaking before me.  I played out a scenario where the speaker before me would have dazzled the kids with his time traveling machine, and then I would be introduced as, "Now we have the guy that fixes your toilet".  "Mmmm...uh, huh" this was going to be great.

Then I thought, "I bet Ben Affleck can't install a water heater with his fake Bawhstin accent, and his superior acting skills".  I saw Good Will Hunting.  Old Ben didn't even know how to swing a hammer.  And the guy with the time travel machine, fu** him!  Big deal.  I bet he wouldn't know how to fix his boiler if it broke down, and would have to freeze his butt off until I got to his house and replaced the thermo-coupling on his pilot assembly.  Take that science guy.  How do you like me now?

In my zeal of my imaginary competition with all of the other professions in the world, somehow I agreed to do the speech.  I think that I said one "Mmmm...uh, huh's" too many.  In that one fleeting moment, I was going to show all those kids that the trades were the way to go.  About five minutes after the call, Ben Affleck and Bill Nye the Science Guy had left my head and I was left with the realization what I had just agreed to do.

I had taken a couple of public speaking courses in college.  I knew that a good public speaker has to engage his audience.  Get the kids interested in plumbing...what could be hard about that?  Oh well, I had a couple of weeks to think about it, and if all else fails, I would just wing it.  And I was quite sure that I was over the reaction my body had to public speaking in the past.  Imagine taking a nice, long, cool drink of sand and cotton balls, and then trying to speak out loud.  Yeah, I was sure that I was over this.

So I began to think how I would engage the kids in this interesting career path.  My first thought for my speech was to go over the five unwritten rules of plumbing.  They are:
      1. Tight is tight.  Too tight is broken.
      2. Shit does not flow uphill.
      3. Hot on the left.  Cold on the right.
      4. Don't bite your fingernails.
      5. Pay day is on Friday.                                                                                                                         

I could hear Ben Affleck in my head saying, "Yeah, wicked pissah Joey boy.  Funny stuff", so I knew that this approach would be a box-office disaster.  And besides, I never really understood Rule # 5, and Rule # 4 I learned the hard way when I was an apprentice.  Let's just say you never forget the taste of the stuff of Rule # 2.  No, let's leave the rules out of it.

I decided the best way to go was to just wing it on the day of the speech.  After all, these were just kids, and I had been coaching kids for years and was used to speaking in front of a whole bunch of them.   I would ask a couple of questions about plumbing, electricity, and carpentry and these kids would relate.  I would make a few jokes, and by the time I was done I would have convinced an entire class of 8th graders that trade school was the way to go.  And, if there was enough time left, we could all break into the Bill Nye the Science Guy theme song, or maybe watch the Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez blockbuster Gigli.  Riveting.

So the big day came, and I was due to speak at 9:30 AM.  I got to the school at 9:00 and sat in the back of the auditorium.  The speaker before me was a young woman who was a massage therapist.  Ok, so no doctors, lawyers, or Hollywood icons (think: Gigli)  "I got this", I thought to myself.  The massage therapist did a great job.  She had visual aids, was concise, and even told a funny story about her work.  Before I knew it, she was done and I was being introduced.

I am not going to say that my speech influenced a group of 8th graders to not want to be doctors or lawyers.  And I am not going to say that I bombed (much like the 2003 romantic comedy Gigli, starring Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez).  Let me just say that I remember what the sand and cotton ball cocktail tastes like, but I had a bottle of water with me.  I winged off a few funny stories about my trade, and the kids seemed to like it.  I did not bite my fingernails (refer to Rule #4), but the experience was not the most comfortable for me either and I was really tempted to to gnaw on a knuckle or two.

When it was all said and done, I could tell that most of the kids were really not that interested in the trades, or becoming an electrician or a plumber.  And I can understand why.  When you are an 8th grader, you should aspire to be Bill Nye the Science Guy, or a doctor or a lawyer...I did. When you are 13 or 14 years old, you want to be a baseball star, or the first woman President.  You want to be an astronaut, or a dentist, or the first person to fly to Mars.  At that age, you should dream big dreams.

I poke fun at Ben Affleck.  He may not be the best actor, but he is doing what he loves to do.  Ok, so Gigli was a bomb, as were a couple of other of his works, and his Boston accent is so forced that it could make shit flow uphill (Refer to Rule # 2), but he seems to be a good husband and father and is providing for his family in a job that he loves to do.

 In my speech to the kids, my most important point that I made is that you have to love what you do for work, so much so, that it is never work.  You must look forward to getting up everyday (well, almost every day) to go to your job.  Dream the big dream, but enjoy the journey most of all.  And look forward to Friday because that is apparently when you get paid.