The Pool Boy

Todays humbling reminder or grace and appreciation has been delivered to us via the pool boys who were setting up to update or facelift our pool.

My parents had been wanting to update the pool in their backyard for quite some time now and as it just so happens, an acquaintance of my dads works in that very business. They get to talk ing and next thing you know, he is bringing us samples and catalogues and just about everything to push the job forward.

- Now, I must say a word of caution, it is a very well known phrase that business and family should not mix. Well, this was not family, but an acquaintance and somewhat of a relationship nonetheless. But continuing on..

My parents decide to proceed with this person doing the job and they get to work right away. They take the pool apart, they order the material and they begin to work. The person contracted, which we will name The Pool Boy for clarities sake, seems pretty professional and organized and timely in their job. The people he hires to work for him speak in dialect and broken Spanish but seem hardworking and knowledgeable. But then the materials come in to play...

They are not using protective ear wear, work shoes, hand held tools rather than professional grade equipment. Then they leave and don't come back for almost a week, The Pool Boy never comes back. He is only reachable by phone. The people that come in to work the next time are a different set of people. Only two are the same. They begin to carry the stones that will be used to line the pool by hand and dropping them. One of them tells the other that he needs to be more careful and the one carrying the stone responds something with an attitude and carries on. They begin to do the cuts for the angles of the pool and end the day. Well, my mom goes to check and starts to see that a lot of the pieces are cracked on the edges and have broken pieces and more. Well.. she tells my dad and then the story takes a turn.

My dad, who is generally much less of a confrontational person, proceeds to ask the worker who appears to be in charge, if they plan on using the stones that are splintered at the edges. He responds that they'll add cement to fill it in. My dad says to him that he doesn't want patch work, he wants to use only the stones that are not splintered and broken since they are at least 50$ each and the store has no problem exchanging any damaged pieces. Well, this time, the man responds to him with an aggressive attitude and tells my dad that he can sort the pieces off himself because he is not about to do that, it is not his job to pick pieces and he doesn't like being told how to do his job so my dad can go return whatever he wants.

wow.

Talk about escalating quickly. My dad goes hey, look, im not telling you how to do your job I am just wanting this project to turn out right, not like a repair job, half of these stone pieces are already chipped. It's the material I'm talking about not your job. He leaves my dad talking and calls The Pool Boy who shows up and has the rudest attitude and face. They begin to pack up their equipment and he essentially says "I'll take the loss on this one" and tell my dad that he's too picky, that he's not letting them work right, that his workers are so bothered by being hovered over and he didn't know it was going to be such a complicated situation etc etc etc. Mind you, one of the complaints was that my dad "Butt in yesterday too" when he had to leave his work, to come and get the electricity going again because they used too many tools at once and shut off the circuit and didn't know how to set it again.

Again, wow.

Anyway, now we are trying to put two and two together and we are coming to the conclusion that more than likely, The Pool Boy, is responsible for landing the jobs and then gets workers to go do those jobs for cheaper. It may be that he was trying to charge my dad extra for materials that are not as expensive as he said, he was changing my dad almost twice as much for materials, and then using the "Fixable" pieces here, so he can keep the good ones for other jobs. Under the umbrella of being acquaintances, there should be bling trust, right? my dad wont be picky and then he has material for other jobs he lands on the side. If not, theory # 2, he hires people and pays them cheap manual labor while only overseeing the jobs and that is why we had different people each day and why when actual accuracy was required, professional skill, they couldn't deliver and it was easier to just walk out on the job. We are creative over-thinkers so I'm sure we will come up with some more as the day goes on.

So unprofessional. So rude. So advantageous and deceitful.

But so necessary.

Because people who have no professionalism, who are okay with ruining a relationship once they don't have the upper-hand, are people who you don't need to continue nurturing a relationship with or keeping near under the illusion of being able to trust them.

So what can we learn from this?

1. Do not go into business with people who you hold dear to you because once money is involved, peoples motives and intentions can blind them to do you wrong.

2. Do not trust blindly in people because of their closeness to you, again, that can be altered if people will put making money over professionalism and integrity.

3. Do not be afraid to ask questions and speak up if you feel you are being wronged. It can only bring clarity to a situation and reveal character from both sides.

4. Finally, if the person presuming to do you wrong has no remorse about doing you dirty, you do not need to feel any guilt about them not getting to continue benefitting from you because you are deciding not to allow them to take advantage of you or use you anymore.

Thank God for the early warning, right now that the pool has not yet been completed.

Thank goodness for the grace he gave us in being able to respectfully say, no more of this, without getting into a heated argument or fight.

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