THE W
The 37th floor of the W Hotel here in Austin has been my workplace for the past year and a half. Every morning starts with a 10 min process to get my car checked with valet, obtain credentials giving me access to the penthouse, and a very long ear-popping elevator ride. I love that I get to bring balance to the valet's life when I roll up in my 2002 Mazda Protege and park next to every flavor of Tesla. It's a place of constant change. Some days I leave feeling like I did something incredible, and other days I look for a different job when I get home.
The company I work for does the high-end metal fabrication. We have constructed some of cool spots in Austin: Eberly, Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, The W Hotel, ETC and tons of private homes. However, most of the people that work for the company are what we call, "bruisers" They are the kind of people that use a hammer to crack an egg. What they needed for this job was "finishers." Finishers coax the yoke out of the egg by persuasion. That’s how I got put into the field. I have a background in doing some highly precise work. Our tolerance for this nightmare is 1/32" (1/64" in either direction). That's about the size of a business card. The tension is very high. Eight people have quit since I started this gig for several reasons. One of which being the owner may or may not of threatened to wipe the flesh off some people’s backs. Every contractor in the building is the best Austin has to offer, and the owners expect nothing less than perfection.
Mr. and Mrs. K bought two penthouses at The W four years ago with intentions of connecting the two with a spiral staircase, but The W shut that down pretty quick. Since their plans got shot down, they decided to dump the budget they had for the two penthouses into just the 37th-floor penthouse. They are people of poor taste and have an outrageous amount of money. It's a lot of money. They are having a couch made of faux leopard print. Kudos on them for not killing leopards, but it's still gross. Now, I'm not well versed in buying fabric, so I don't know what an average price is, but I'm pretty sure that $70k is high. They are also spending another $50k on the frame of the couch. That's right; they are spending $120k on something to sit on.
In contrast, I spent $130k on my three-bedroom house. Everything in this penthouse is needlessly expensive and flashy. It makes me so sad to see such waste.
I grew up poor. Like, poor. My dad never made over $18k until I was married and out of the house. We lived in an RV for almost four years because someone gave it to us, and our rent was like $200 a month. Most nights, we had some gut-filling meals like cornbread and beans. I enjoyed my childhood, but I know now that it wasn't awesome. We had our setbacks that probably kept my parents up in the middle of the night, wondering how they were going to make it through the years with two growing boys. I'm sure that has something to do with my issues with Mr. and Mrs. K spending such an absurd amount of money on their penthouse. I know that they could give half of their budget to those that have no home and still have a badass place to live. However, I have to remind myself that I am not Mr. K. I didn't inherit $800 million from my mother. I have no idea what his life is like. He could be an incredibly generous and loving man that seeks out ways to give to the less fortunate. He could've cut his couch budget from $220k to $120k. There is absolutely no way to know. The point is, I am not him. It is easy for me to judge him and his exorbitant spending habits because I can't imagine spending more than I make in a year on a friggin' body holder.
I may never understand the desire for such extravagance, but I get the sentiment. Mr. K wants to fill his new home with the best money can buy. He wants his wife to be happy. He wants a place that his adult children marvel at. It makes us feel good to have things that other people proclaim amazement. I feel good when people are in awe of a guitar I built or an image I captured that is stunning. My heart fills with pride and self-confidence, and that feels pretty dang good. Maybe this guy doesn't have a single bone in his body that he is genuinely proud of. Perhaps the only thing he has to offer his family is money and stuff, gaudy, shiny stuff. If that is the case, that truly makes me sad. Hard work and dedication brings joy, confidence, and levelheadedness. To think that this man may never experience such joy, makes me feel sorry for him. I am confident in my photographic and precision building ability. I have worked hard and sacrificed a lot to achieve the level of work that I do, and I make a decent living. I would love to offer my wife the house of her dreams or a four-month vacation to the south of France. I can't imagine the kind of joy that must bring the giver, but until then, I'm happy with my little slice of the world.