THEY THOUGHT IT WAS JUST ROADWORK—BUT THEN THE CREW INVITED THEM TO “THE MEETING”
One of the workers, a guy with a hard hat and dusty boots, looked over and gave the boys a nod. Then he waved them closer. I hesitated for a second, but he smiled and said, “You mind if they sit in on the safety briefing?”
Next thing I knew, my three little guys were plopped down on a folded-up mat, orange vests draped over their tiny shoulders, eyes wide like they were being told state secrets. The crew kept working behind them, steam puffing from the asphalt machines, the smell of tar thick in the air.
The guy crouched down next to them, pointing at the big roller and saying things like, “Always make sure you double-check the lockout,” and, “Teamwork starts with trust, even on a hot day.” You could tell he wasn’t just humoring them—he was actually teaching.
I stayed back, just watching, trying not to cry like some overly emotional mom.
And then my youngest, Ellis, raised his hand and asked, “What do you do if your teammate gets too tired?”
The worker paused, looked him straight in the eye, and said something that made me stop breathing for a second.
He said, “Then you carry the weight for a while. That’s what real teams do.”
And just as they all nodded in unison, like it was the most obvious truth in the world, one of the other workers called out—“We’re starting in two. Bring the new guys.”
I looked around, thinking they meant someone else. But the first worker, the one who had been so patient with my kids, stood up and grinned at me.
“You’re welcome too, if you want. It’s nothing formal—just our daily meeting.”
I was skeptical, of course. A meeting? With my kids? On a live construction site? But the man—his name turned out to be Rick—held out a small radio and a pair of safety glasses. “It’s just a thing we do. Community stuff. We call it ‘The Meeting.’ You’ll see.”
I glanced at my watch. We had nowhere urgent to be, and the boys looked like they’d just been invited backstage at a rock concert. So I nodded. “Alright. Let’s go.”
We followed them past the cones, past the “ROAD CLOSED” signs, and into a shaded area where a dozen or so workers were gathering around a whiteboard propped against the side of a battered truck. Someone handed out water bottles and protein bars like it was standard protocol.
Rick stood at the front and kicked things off. But it wasn’t about equipment checks or timelines. It was something else entirely.
He started with a question: “Anyone here been carrying too much lately?”
One by one, guys raised their hands. A man with grease on his jeans said his daughter had been sick. Another, with silver hair poking out from his hard hat, mentioned taking care of his dad, who had dementia. Someone else talked about missing their kid’s baseball game.
No one interrupted. No one rolled their eyes. They just listened.