Cowan Custom Finishing
CCB 225044
acowan1216@gmail.com
503.791.7473
Welcome to my business blog!
I would say my most frequent question is,
HOW DID YOU GET INTO CONSTRUCTION?
When I was 18, or about a hundred years ago,,,, I attended and graduated the pre apprentice program at tongue point job corps. For whatever it's worth that's also where I met my husband! So about 20 years ago now.
In August 2001, after recovering from a broken upper right arm, from arm wrestling, yes I know, it was horrible, that's a whole other story..... about 2 weeks after my cast was off, I graduated the program and got my first REAL, on the books, IN THE UNION, JOB!!!!!
That first job was at lewis and clark gradeschool, and I started before the first concrete pour. My first day there were 3 other apprentice carpenters working, and YES I was the only woman.
On my first day,,,, I got told to help pack lumber for concrete forms. wanting to show my worth, I got that done pretty quickly.... but then I HAD NOTHING TO DO, and the boss was busy. so I decided to start cleaning up, because in school, the teacher told me, you'll never get in trouble for cleaning if you have nothing else to do. NEVER STAND THERE looking stupid!!
so, I'm picking up scraps of wood,
leaned over in my own world just TRYING to stay busy and be worth what they're paying me. Which was a lot more an hour than I had EVER made before in my life.
WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?
a hoarse scary voice barks at me.
"I dont know" i say. shrugging my shoulders.
DONT EVERY SAY THAT!! make something up!
OKAY? I reply.
he says, you were CLEANING UP!
Im like, yeah.......
he says, anyone who cleans without being told usually works for me a LONG TIME and you've only been here two hours?!! I thought he was mad, but now I'm getting a vibe he's not.
I'm just trying to do a good job, I say.
He says, you know how you KNOW if you're doing a good job for ME?
how, I asked him?
You get one check on friday...
me just looking puzzled.... he continues.
IF you ever get two checks on friday, that means you're laid off and not coming back the next week. so as long as friday afternoon rolls around and you have ONE CHECK, you're doing a good job.
Okay, and I continue cleaning....
That first week wrapped up and he laid off all THREE of those other apprentices.
and he says, watch this.
gives all three of the dudes their "two checks" and says, see ya on the next one.
I didn't say a word.
he says, you know why I did that?
why?
because i get as MUCH WORK OUT OF YOU AS ALL THREE OF THOSE BOZOS!!!
welcome to the crew.
I knew, I'd finally found "my people"
that first boss of mine, taught me how to work. how to KEEP a construction job, how to keep my head down, and my mouth shut and my HANDS BUSY..... he was a good teacher, and If I'm HALF as good, I'll be absolutely ecstatic!
Soooooooo working in the union, and in Portland during the week, coming home on weekends, time flew by. I worked away from home a LOT and I didn't like it. I was alone in a motel room becuase the guys had to share, and I didn't. the guys would get jealous I got my own room and I got jealous because they had a friend. sometimes I'd bring mike if he wasn't working but that hardly every happened. So in 2006 I stopped working union, and got a job on the residential side, in my home town.
I've worked for high end door and window companies, where I worked on million and up ocean front homes, I've installed hardware on doors that cost more than twenty grand, I've worked on mobile homes and everything in between.
Most of my experience is with DOORS, WINDOWS, DECKS, SIDING, and FENCES.
There's a whole list of things I can do, and I have lots of experience in. One thing I've promised myself, is I will never take on a project where I would be "over my head" or just too much for me to handle. So far, this has been a Non issue. If something is over my head, or out of my realm, I just say that pretty quickly and try to steer the client to someone who CAN HELP THEM. other contractors certainly don't mind.
I love what I do. More specifically,
I love making people's homes EASIER to live in, or increasing their QUALITY of life, by providing as much value as humanly possible.
A close second, is the ability to solve problems for people when they thought the solution was out of reach or just not attainable. I LOVE THAT.... I love finding an answer that we can both live with. When a client chooses ME, we area TEAM.....
LIFE HAS TAUGHT ME TO BE A GOOD PROBLEM SOLVER!!!!!
What problem can I solve for you??
There's been a lot of hard days, and many times I dealt with situations, I did NOT Deserve. The bosses who weren't afraid of the "girl" have been there though, albeit few and far between, they always had my back, and THAT kept me going. If you think about women working in male dominant jobs, MOST of them work three times harder than male counterparts, for about 80% of the pay.
To wrap up, I started on my own in January of 2019. I'm happily married to the same man since 2003 and we have two rowdy boys who are 5 and 11. My brother lives across the river and is battling lymphoma. (stage four)
My parents live in town and help us with the kids so we don't have the HUGE expense of daycare. I've been recovering from opiate addiction since April 14th of 2011. Summer of 2006 I had a bad fall and they prescribed me painkillers and it went downhill from there. I'm very open about that part of my life, but this POST, was just not the place for it. I hope potential clients will see the VALUE in my open and honest personality. I'll always be "straight" with you, and expect the same in return.
Thanks for reading my blog. thanks for supporting my business and my dreams!!!!
From this post forward, I'll be writing about construction related questions, so if you have any great ideas, or questions, DONT BE SHY!!!! email me, text me, message me, LET ME KNOW!!
THE FAMILY........
