Opening day for any project can be hectic, so it's not unusual for the run-up to actually opening the doors to be like trying to organize a litter of kittens into a marching band. And that's if there are no surprises. There are always the odd late deliveries to deal with, or equipment glitches to tweak out, or subcontractors that disappear at the wrong time or show up in the wrong place, and we generally have contingency plans to deal with those kinds of things. There are some events, however, that just plain defy the logic of planning. And knowing the history of this job, I should have known that things were going just a bit too smoothly here at the end. After all, over the last three years we've had to deal with hurricanes, heart attacks, bankrupt subcontractors, falling precast panels, labor unrest, immigration round-ups, and concrete rationing, to name just a few of the dozens of unusual events and mysterious happenings that have come up during the course of construction here. So I should have known that although it had been really frantic in the last months trying to get the work done and inspections signed off it was all just a little too, uhmmm......normal.
So....when I looked out at the building from the office trailer compound and saw a huge column of smoke billowing out over the roof of the loading dock I was actually surprised. "Dammit bubba, that just doesn't look right," I thought. Three years of construction, and now, less than a week away from handing over the keys, we're gonna burn the place down? Perfect! Luckily, it was a dumpster full of cardboard that caught fire, probably from a carelessly tossed butt, and not the actual building. And we were able to get a forklift over to it and pull it away from the building before it caused any damage. The fire department came, and after doing a thorough investigation of the scene decided that the only real hazard was to the dumpster itself, so they decided to take advantage of the opportunity to try out their new ladder truck in a variety of positions and ladder / hose configurations as they soaked the dumpster and loading dock area.
That next morning I got some good natured ribbing from the folks in the hospital as I walked through the building. No big deal, just glad yesterday's incident didn't really do anything to disrupt the ongoing setup work, especially here in the kitchen where the chef was starting up the kitchen equipment in preparation for the upcoming open house event. As I walked across the atrium floor one of the hospital staff, in a panic, came running up hollering "Andy man there's a toilet overflowing in the kitchen you've gotta come fix it!" No big deal, right? How bad could a stopped up toilet be to fix? So imagine my surprise when I opened the door into the kitchen to see a couple of inches of toilet water (to be polite) standing on the floor of the kitchen, and a steady stream of fresh toilet water streaming out from under the door of the staff restroom and into the food prep area. Yeah. Gotta love that. Luckily, the chef was pretty cool about it as he flashed his big butcher's knife at me and let me know that there would be filet on the menu that night and that it was completely up to me to determine if it would be beef or not. Also on the lucky side, we've got a great bunch of folks on the job, and once I got the 911 call out on the radio to our superintendents and labor crew we got the situation under control pretty quickly. In less than five minutes we had the source of the overlow isolated and shut down, and the cleanup and sanitizing completed in time to allow the chef to finalize his menu selections in a favorable manner. And it turned out that the root cause of the problem was towels that had been flushed down one of the toilets upstairs in the OR area. Curious, huh? Like you, once I heard that's what the problem was I immediately wondered how and why someone would be flushing towels down the toilet and just exactly how many flushes would it take to get the entire towel downward bound?
And then....everything went quiet again for a few days. On the day of the VIP reception and open house the morning came in clear and cool, with a light breeze off Biscayne Bay that gently rustled the fronds on the royal palms in the parking lot. All the workers and staff had gotten situated and were busy with their tasks, and I had just finished my morning meeting with our Owner's rep when I got a call on the radio. Our superintendent Mark, a physical giant of a man and one of the calmest, most laid back people that has ever walked this planet (he's from Elmore County, Alabama, by god) called from the parking area right next to the hospital front entrance, which just happened to be the place where all of the VIP attendees for that night's reception would be parking. "Uhmm, hey bro, you got a minute?" "Sure thing, Mark, what's up?" "Well, ahhh, you know anything about bees?" "They sting and they make honey, I guess. Why?" "Well, I gotta tell you, man, it looks to me like we're either gonna have a bunch of honey or a whole lot of bee stung suits tonight. Maybe both" Long pause, then "What the heck are you talking about, Mark?" "Maybe you oughta come out and see this, bro, 'cause there's the biggest swarm of bees out here I've ever seen, and it looks like they're settling right in to these live oaks out here." Sweet.....
We got the local beekeeper out, of course, and he weaved his magic and the bees disappeared.
And the open house events that weekend went really well, with no further Murphyisms or Steven King type episodes. And the last week was busy and stressful, but predictable, and, to paraphrase Ms. Piercy, there's real comfort and satisfaction that comes with bending your back to a task and slogging ahead through the muck towards an end in common rhythm with a team of men and women pulling equally at your side. And that's how it went, all the way up to Sunday morning when the old hospital closed their ER and we opened up the doors here. It took until around noon to transfer the hundred or so patients from there to here, and by early afternoon the new place was in full scale operation.
So, a little before noon on Sunday, May 6, 2007, after three years of fitting together countless puzzle pieces of concrete, steel, wood, and glass, and two weeks of fire, flood, and plague, we could really call this place a hospital when the first miracle happened here - little Ramona Quiala came squealing into the world at six pound fifteen ounces. I was up on one of the patient floors when they announced her arrival over the intercom, and for an instant my mind flashed to the thousands of men and women whose efforts made this moment come together, and all of the long days and sleepless nights that have passed since I got here from Denver. We all bitch about our jobs from time to time, and I know I've done more than my share of that, but to have been able to play out my small role in making this miracle happen here is rocket fuel for the soul.
Cool stuff brothers and sisters, very,very cool stuff.
Gotta run now, and get to bed before it gets too late.
