Why Do We Do It?
5:43 AM – October 4, 2016
Last week we established what we do. We Sell Dirt. But the question my daughter Aurelia asked was why? I have successfully avoided the answer for a week because I did not know how to answer the question. “Keeping the lights on” or “trying to make a living” are simply not real answers and it is hardly what the question deserves.
To say that it is a complex answer is a good place to start and accept there are a myriad of factors which led to my current occupation. One thing I knew for sure early on in life was I did not like “missing stuff”. To this day, I can recall being on a school bus feeling like I was being taken away from the world into a building where I was “missing stuff” and for whatever reason I did not find it acceptable being told I had to be there. That is a strange thought I admit for an 8 or 10-year-old, but I think all the years of school seeing the world going on around me, but not being out there bugged me. I think that is where it started, I knew I wanted to be entrepreneurial and be out there with folks. So after nearly ten years working for Ducks Unlimited and then later as an environmental consultant, I knew there was another step. I wanted my own gig. Real Estate seemed a natural fit, as it was dynamic and I was always out with the folks. Early on I met a few land brokers and I was hooked on the person to person aspect of the process as well. It is the best and worst brain teaser ever undertaken. Getting the folks to get along long enough they can trade dirt is interesting and requires a great deal of patience and experience with the human heart. I often feel like a glorified taxi cab driver working to get folks from point A to B. That’s it, no more. While it is true, all the background in soils, ecology and land use planning “helps” it is still a question of working with people to find solutions and create opportunities. Fundamentally, “We Sell Dirt” to help folks accomplish their goals and affect positive change on the landscape around us. The land sustains us, grows our farms, supplies our food, gives framework to our towns, cities, and life as we create it. It is the basis from which everything physical we build starts and being a part of this is an excellent way not to “miss anything”.
It only took a paragraph and a few run on sentences (my grammar school teacher will cringe). That was a lot of self-control not to turn that into a long winded bit of drivel but Aurelia likes me to get right to the point, as a 6-year-old she is busy and ready to get to the next thing. She never wants to “miss anything”, I guess she gets that honest. Perhaps one day I will be working for her!
Onward!
