ENOUGH ABOUT STICKS ALREADY

His name was Merle and he was known in these parts as the best stone, brick, and block mason in the land. He had been in business for fifty years. He had called me several times over several months. Wanted to know if he could get a massage without an appointment. No I had told him, I am booked.
Then one day he called and I said yes, come on over. He came over, and during that first visit, I told him about the house that I was building. He asked if there would be a fireplace. I told that I was planning on building a stone one. Of course he wanted me to have his boys do it. He had just retired and turned the business over to them. No I said I prefer to do everything myself, and I can't afford your boys. He told me that everyone who had tried to do it themselves had eventually given up and called him back, but that he would gladly come and give me some pointers, if I wanted.
He came one morning when I was ready and prepared per his instructions. Plastic on the floor, covered with old carpet. A large table set up just in the right location, with plenty of rocks on it, so you can roll them around and look at all sides and get to know them. First we mixed the mortar to just the right consistency. Then he showed me how to pick out a good rock to go against the wall, and what makes a good rock for the corner.
When all was ready to lay the first rocks, he said that he couldn't get down on the floor anymore. So I'd have to do the doing, and he the telling. Merle was sixty five years old then, and beat up from years of hard labor. I was fifty five, beat up from hard labor, but rejuvenated by a couple of years of weekly massage.
So, he showed me how to lay stone and then left. He came back at the end of the day to show me how to scrape the joints. He was pretty dumbfounded that I was still at it, and loving every minute of it.
I think that how to scrape the joints was the most important lesson. It is the difference between a good job and a bad. You wait until the mortar is just set enough, then you carve it away until it is of uniform depth and width and flows together like a river.
So, I built this one. It's just a gas log fireplace, no firebox. A few years later with more of Merle's tips, I built a real log burning one out of brick in the massage room.
Perhaps you are starting to see a pattern here. Like what ever I need, I am given.
Merle came for weekly massages for years, had his first grandson about two years ago.
The biggest lesson that masonary has taught me, is not to look at the whole, just start and then just keep laying one brick at a time, and you'll be amazed at what you get done.