Submitted by Tresler on Thu, 2006-11-30 12:56.
Ok, time to finish this up. Every time I think of something else to write I think that I should finish this and then don't write anything. How's that turn of phrase go...? I have 99 things to do and finishing the Macy's blog story ain't one of them.
We board our respective buses and get a police escort from the warehouse to Central Park West. Its always bizarre having a police escort, makes you feel important or dangerous, somehow 'other' than the rest of the world.
So its 12:30ish and still raining and the NYC crew is all wondering why we didn't just show up here in the first place. Seriously, we all just spent six and a half hours to get a nice pep talk.
We head on down to the front of the lineup. You always work front to back. Just in case things get hairy the front of the lineup can start while the back is finishing up. There have been cases when workers jumped on the floats and kept working as it was going down the route - not in my years, but in the past.
I don't want to bore you too much with written details of how these things go together. That, and Macy's might not like that too much either. I will tell you that things have gotten much better in design in recent years.
We used to nail things don to be torn up later, now there are thumbscrews for everything. Things used to be made out of heavy steel and wood, now things are mostly steel frames and foam with a hard coat. This is a double edged sword. You can't accidentally crush a 2x4 as you can foam. 'Delicate' is not what we are looking for here, but 'light weight' is a definite bonus.
This year we had four assigned floats. U.S. Postal, Green Dog, Echo Mountain, and Pep Rally.
U.S. Postal is a giant eagle, 3 crane picks, and trim... takes about an hour to an hour and a half.
Green Dog is new, 5 or 6 crane picks and some high-up work. Spacepods and a base station!
Rhino Mountain we've almost got down to a science, but not quite. It is a three story tall giant Rhino that looks to be carved out of rock. Rock climbers repel down it during the parade. Its between 9 and 11 crane picks and takes the longest of all.
Pep Rally is an easy float that takes about half an hour. It is usually done for us by the time we finish the rest of our work.
Now the dynamics of working with people show that everyone wants to be doing the interesting jobs, which is rarely the best way to get things done. During setup I generally try to keep moving doing the little stuff whenever they have more than enough people working the cranes or such. There's plenty of time to be the hero later on... So on Rhino Mtn. I usually do the picks up from the utility, making sure that we aren't wasting time unstrapping something while the crane is waiting. This year was a little different as our crew had changed and I went up to land the pieces with Ben. U.S. postal I did the pick ups and straightened the trim. And so forth.
We finished ok, despite the rain. Each year when we finish we walk up and don the route looking for people we know arriving to operate the floats on the route, looking for any crisis that have escaped out attention, etc. Usually a surreal moment as ballerinas and marchng bands start to appear out of the pre-dawn gloom. None of that this year. A quick look to see if anyone needs help, shout to the crew head that we're on the bus if needed, and off for a quick to hour nap.
Tear down. First, a word about chili. I don't know who came up with this, but we are fed egg sandwiches around 2 in the morning and then Chili at breakfast time. Yes, chili is a fine, hearty, hot meal, but at this stage of the game you're playing with fire. Who knows what my boy is going to do with this overly spicy substance (yes, I just called it too spicy... if you know me, that means something to you).
During setup everything is lined up neatly along CPW and four cranes can run up and down the route pretty easily. Tear down is on two narrower side streets, two cranes per street with a decent distance between the two. Once you start a float, you almost have to finish it. So if you start a float at the first crane, just as they finish one on the second crane - you've screwed up and half the street is backed up waiting on you to finish.
Pile on top of that the fact that a lot of the teamsters that drive the floats are tired an want to go home - nevermind that they spent the night in a brand new GMC with heating. They turn the corner and once in a while nail a wing of a float on something. Lightpost, scaffolding, tow trucks, police cars generally ding more damage to the float than the structure, but still, no fun.
Tear down is where I feel I shine a little. I'm not as good as I used to be, but I can still kick it up a notch and have a reserve of energy that many can't tap into. People are dropping like flies. Rules are you can't go home until everyone finishes - but you can stare into space from the sidewalk.
Presence of mind is almost more important here than anytime before. I'm amazed at peoples capacity to try to run a crew to tear down something they hae never even seen before, but digress.
Did I mention its still raining. I got a change of clothes on the bus with that two hour nap, but they are wet again already.
So from about 9:45 through to 4:30 we put it all back like we found it. It all needs to be tied down so we don't lose anything on the way to NJ. and then off it goes.
Sign out. Wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving, and catch a cab to Leighton's for dinner. Some people promise o show up - but we know they are going to get home and crash.
Enter into a Thanksgiving day well in progress. Make a b line for your third set of clothing and find a cup of coffee. Its WARM again, the smell of good food is everywhere, isn't this amazing. If you ever find yourself not feeling as thankful as you should at Thanksgiving dinner, I recommend spending the night before and the day leading up to out in the cold rain. Turkey never tasted so good.
Bev, and Karen, and Jess, and Craig, and a bunch of others toil away for 3 days to make the most amazing spread you've ever seen. But that isn't what makes it so great. What makes it so great is that this entire group are mostly people that see me for about 5 hours a year. They welcome me (and others) into their home and celebration and don't think twice about the smelly, nasty, delirious people that just walked in he door. This is normal. This is expected.
At this point I start to lose focus. Talk of the years events. Talk of parade. Some staring off into space for myself. The entire place just goes out of its way to radiate comfort, and welcome.
An this entire episode, from Veselka's diner to the end of Thanksgiving dinner does a lot to put things in perspective. Sure, work encompasses a lot of my life. Maybe I've lost some things dear to me over the year. Maybe life is tough and stressful. But once a year I can put all that aside for three days (I do nothing on friday) and really remember what its all about, in a way I don't think very many can.
Thank you to all who make my Thanksgiving a unique, extraordinary, colorful experience every year!
