Ken sent me a picture of the Fish Market’s new paint job. (Ken’s up in the top window.) I asked him to tell us about his career as a house painter. Here he goes:
“Not much to say about painting. Usually has a bad reputation. Painters that is. House painters that is. This career is home to many alcoholics, mostly because it is so easy to get into: a ladder, a bucket, a scraper, a brush and a phone # is all you need to start your own business. Hard to smell booze on a painter when he is 30 ft up high on a ladder – speaking of high, when I first got hired with a paint company I was immediately put in closets. (That’s where they put beginners. 1, to see if you can paint; 2, if you can’t paint and the customer can’t see you the owner won’t know he is getting charged 35.00 an hour for a painter who is worth about 4.50.) I was high off of BIN…shellac based stain sealer that can be cut and cleaned with denatured alcohol. Things went down from there.
Shortly after getting promoted out of closets the boss left me and my friend Dave on a job out in Stratham, NH.
He said, “You guys finish the job and I’ll see you in a couple of days.”
The owner of the house – and he couldn’t talk very well and he could hear just a little – he was a stroke victim. The sun was hot and the radio kept cutting out of reception depending on where you were on the ladder. Frustrated we went the the liquor store in North Hampton and got some vodka. We came back out and saw our boss at the gas station about a 40 yards away.
I said “Dave don’t look now but the boss is runnin’ up to the van…”
“Shut the fuck up,” Dave said and I said, “No, really.”
The boss comes right up to the van and and said, “Hey, will you guys take the rest of the ladders off my truck and take ‘em back to your job? I have to go to the dealership.”
We said “Sure.”
He didn’t even say anything about the liquor store! As soon as we had his ladders tied to our van we were off, laughin’ like a mother fucka’ and tearin’ into the vodka. Next thing I remember I wake up at my house. Dave called and said he drove the red company van home after dropping me off. Apparently we’d gone to the Old Bridge for a few instead of back to work. He also said he might of hit something on the way home. With the red company van.
I told him to pick me up and we’ll handle it. He drove up with a head light smashed and drooping lower than my saggy eye*. We drove back the route Dave took and saw 3 mail boxes and a planter box obliterated. That explained it.
Laughing all the way with a pounding headache to a junkyard, not having any money because I spent it all the night before buyin’ drinks for a 59 year old jaguar with crooked teeth dancing to songs played by a Tesla cover band. So I was told. I was trying to drink ashes out of the ashtrays. So I’m told.
Anyhow we stuffed all the auto parts that we needed in our shirts and down our pants. We probably walked like we’d been in a car wreck. Back to the job, the ladders were still on the house, the radio was still blarin’, comin’ in like a champ, the guy with the stroke waved, our paint was still in the buckets. A little viscous though. Not bad.
I stopped drinking and rent some warehouse space where I refinish and restore doors, furniture, and cabinets. I have to pee now. See ya…”
*Ken was in an avalanche that crushed one cheek bone, so he has a bit of a droopy eye on that side of his face. If he doesn’t make jokes about it we will.
