Just logged my 10,000th hour in the cab and it hit me different

I was finishing up a job moving steel beams for a new warehouse in Tacoma, and my logbook ticked over to 10,000 hours. I always thought that number was just a thing you hear about, like the '10,000 hour rule' for being an expert. But sitting there, it wasn't about being an expert. It was about all the mornings I got up at 4 AM for a pour, the times I sat through a storm delay for three hours, and the muscle memory of a thousand lifts. I remembered my first day on a small mobile crane, shaking so bad I could barely line up the hook. Now I can feel the wind shift through the seat. Has anyone else hit a big hour mark and had it make you look back on the grind?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_oliver21d ago

Yeah, that "feel the wind shift through the seat" part is it. The hours just turn into a feeling in your bones.

the_jake21d ago

You ever go back and look at your old logbooks? I keep my first one in the glove box. Seeing my shaky handwriting from day one next to the clean entries now shows the real story. It's not about being an expert, it's about all the little things you stopped having to think about. You just know how the rig will settle on soft ground, or the exact sound a winch makes when a load is balanced right.