Painting The Floors

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My 12-year-old daughter asked me, “Dad, have you ever painted the floor before?”

“Yes honey, I painted the floors you walk on everyday.”

She looked in disbelief and responded with, “but they aren't painted.” It didn't take another moment for it to dawn on her that they were painted under the carpet and laminate flooring.

We had a short discussion about why you would paint a concrete sub-floor. Mostly to keep water and dirt from doing damage to the “bones” of the building. Simply put, to keep the mud out.

So, we had my brother help with the heavy lifting, per usual. We cleared the room that would be my future office, where my goal was nothing short of re-defining my life's work and in the process sharing my American Dream with the rest of my community.

My wife used a putty knife to scrape up the peeling paint and we swept. Then, we drove two blocks to a business with over a hundred years of history in La Junta, La Junta Trading Company. I didn't have the money for the paint and supplies, but they let me charge it. Not on my credit card, but on my company charge account. I didn't tell Tracy that I had purchased what I needed to pursue my new business endeavor because I didn't have to. She asked my wife in a quiet voice so I wouldn't hear, “What's Adrian doing now?” She responded honestly and with muted words, “Something big.”

Something big indeed. I couldn't sleep at night. The initial concept came to me and new pieces would not stop flooding through my head. I spent several days with loved ones spewing concepts and ideas that finally coalesced into words on paper, but only after my family had to tell me to shut up about it. I don't blame them, a week ago I wouldn't have believed me either.

I had come upon the realization that I have the pieces to pursue my life's work in earnest. That the mold can be broken and re shaped in a way that better fits and serves the community I care about.

I told my inner circle that my plan was nothing less than to re-write the definition of Journalism and then to apply the culmination of my career experience to make it bigger than me and possibly bigger than the community I live and love in.

The first step was painting the floor. I helped move the furniture and prepped for paint. While buying supplies I saw a friend and client at the hardware store. Knowing he had experience I lacked, I asked him what he recommended. He said that someone he worked for had a white floor they had put a marble effect on and he sold it to me as the coolest floor he'd ever seen. So, I bought in. We left with primer and satin white for the initial coats then planned on applying black and grey with some “take for free” newspaper classifieds.

We sealed it with two coats of primer, we painted it white and we slept on it before deciding which colors to 'marble' it with. First thing in the morning, Abby showed me the complexity and artistic talent needed to pull off what I was hoping for. We decided lets just do a tri-color blotchy pattern with some colors that would go with the light purple on the wall.

We went back to La Junta Trading Company and told Tracy's brother Matt about our plan to accent the sub-floor with two other colors and he helped us decide on paint brand and finish. I have always enjoyed watching the strain of marketing involved in naming a color. To me the names of the colors were almost as important as how they looked because it represents a level in creativity that I had always hoped to achieve in my career. When I step across my new work space I walk on “Cloud Mountain,” anyways that's when ambitions are lofty. When I'm “putting up the good fight” I wanted a color choice to remind myself that I will have to watch what I step in. Let's just say it's not Gotta-have-it-Green, but if you come to visit my office you'll probably think you've stepped in it.

I told my daughter that you paint the sub-floor to keep the mud out because she's 12. I know, and you know, that that's not mud. To make change we trudge through the mud and much worse, metaphorically and literally. So if you are ever in my office with me you'll need to look down and make sure you didn't get any on you too.

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