SCOTT LUDWIG: Income statements

On a hot summer afternoon shortly after our grandson turned 6, Cindy and I were working in our backyard while Krischan was busy pulling our green utility cart here and there. We were thirsty, so we asked him if he’d go up to the house to get us something to drink. Krischan walked up to the house, still clutching the handle of the green cart and pulling it behind him.

A couple of minutes later he returned with two popsicles in the cart. “Green Gator delivery,” he said as he handed both of us a popsicle. We thanked him, then he replied, “That will be 10 cents each.” I said that I shouldn’t have to pay for something I already paid for, since I bought the popsicles at the grocery store in the first place.

“It’s not for the popsicles; it’s for the delivery,: he said.

Food delivery companies should be thankful Krischan didn’t know anything about intellectual property at the time. He just might have applied for a copyright, and then the good folks at Door Dash would all have to go out and get a real job. Either that, or they could be working for Krischan.

Krischan has always been creative in coming up with ways to earn money. Privately, I thought of his ideas as “income statements,” because that was what he was doing: stating different ways that he could generate income.

During Krischan’s summer break the following year, the two of us would take long walks through our neighborhood. We always took a dog biscuit along for Coco, the chihuahua up the street who was always excited to see us. Well, excited to see Krischan anyway, since he was the one with the biscuits. Before long, we were taking a small bag of biscuits with us on our walks and handing them out to every dog we ran into.

Over time, all of the neighborhood dogs knew that if they saw either one of us, a biscuit was in their immediate future. We eventually learned the name of every dog in the neighborhood, as well as which ones could take a biscuit in their mouth without biting us on the hand.

One day Krischan came up with an idea: Why don’t we get all of the dogs’ owners to agree to pay us every time we give their dog a biscuit? We could keep track and give them a bill at the end of each month. This, coming from a kid who had never even known the pleasure of an ice cream truck.

Although we are still the biscuit distributor of choice to all the dogs in the neighborhood, we never took any money for it. But I still thought it was a pretty good idea.

Not long after that, Krischan started his first company. He named it Greengator, and Krischan assumed the position of president — since the company was his idea in the first place — and I was designated as its sole employee. My job was to, well, do practically everything since there wasn’t anyone else to do it.

But Krischan pitched in when he could. At first we built simple household items out of pallet wood, and as we got better at it, we started building simple household items out of pallet wood that people wouldn’t object to actually having in their home.

To capitalize on our — or should I say Krischan’s — success, we turned the upstairs of our detached garage into Greengator headquarters. All of the furnishings are green: couch, table, chairs, and lamps. We even designed a company logo that was put on display along the staircase leading to Krischan’s office.

At the time, we even had our own website: www.greengator.org. While it’s no longer active, you can still see some of our early creations there.

As I think back, Krischan’s inclination for making income statements might have originated when Cindy and I first moved to Senoia in 2014. Some afternoons Krischan and I would get in my truck and drive over to Dead Oak Road to pick up any trash on the ground between Rising Star Road and Hardy Road. His pay for a couple of hours of work — even though Krischan thought of it more as play than work at the time — was a trip to the Golden Arches for his favorite meal.

I didn’t pay him back then, but again, that was a long time ago.

Now that Krischan is almost as big as I and a whole lot stronger, I always have projects for him to do in and around our house when he comes to visit. He’s become very capable at working in the yard, using the tools in my workshop, and moving heavy things that are a bit much for his ailing G-Pa’s back.

As I said, a long time ago Krischan was content being rewarded for his work with something as simple as an order of chicken fingers and fries. A long time ago. Before Krischan understood the real meaning of income statements.