My Father's Knife

[This post was shared yesterday in the Oasis newsletter, Oasismin.org]

Are you a list keeper? I’m less of one in retirement though I turn to a list when it feels that too many things need to be tended with too little time. Mostly I just show up at 151 and start in. Usually there is a project that looms large, but it is all connected and I’ve learned that sometimes the minor aspects can become the major focus for the day. Like the other day when I thought my task was wiring ceiling lights in the upstairs bathroom but when I got there I realized I had to take out a third of the studs in the new bathroom wall because they had twisted all to hell, and I had to replace them before I could drill holes through the studs of the renewed wall to run the electric cables.

But what do I do when Theresa has a program at 151 and I can’t be there to flow the work? Lately I have used the opportunity to head to my shop at the Homestead. My shop in the garage at 151 is a worksite shop. I go there to crosscut or rip boards. I go there to retrieve lumber for a wall I’m working on. I go there to store a new/used frig for the kitchen that is not quite ready for it. But I would never go there to hangout for the day. I relish doing just that in the Homestead shop.

Last weekend I went there on Saturday while Theresa was doing her Prana Vidya program at 151. I thought I’d spend the time on a project my daughter Bekah requested, a shoe shelf case.

So, I was focused when I entered the shop. I had a stack of white pine boards and a cut list for what I needed. I’d start by jointing one surface of the boards and then thickness plane them all before jointing an edge and cutting to the dimensions I needed. I went to the drawer where I keep my dial caliper for measuring thickness. In looking for it I spied a small box labeled “Dad’s Knives.” That is the point where I moved away from my list. When I opened that box, the plan for the morning flew out the window along with a few carpenter bees.

As I opened the box, I opened once again to the missing of my father. The knives are an odd collection. There is even a scalpel in the mix, as if he did brain surgery on the side. I pulled out the two oldest knives.

They are small, like a child’s knife, and they probably were. I picture him using them the age he was in the photo at the top of this post. But small is also a good size for a pocket. Unlike my dad’s garden hoes, which he kept sharp enough to shave with, these knives were dull—very dull. I don’t think he’d used them much as an adult. I don’t have memories of them in his hands, but it was to his hands that the knives took me. I miss them. It has been almost nine years since I’ve been touched by his hands.

I often think of his hands this time of year as he busied them in planting and tending his garden, which he did every spring of his entire adult life. I picked tomatoes from his garden days after he died.

I cleaned the knives. I polished the blades and trim with a maroon pad. I added a little Jojoba oil to the blades and worked it in to the inner surfaces. Then I wiped them off with a soft cloth and tucked the single blade knife into my pocket, because, interestingly enough, I had just misplaced my always-in-my-pocket-wherever-I-am-other-than-on-an-airplane-knife. I thought I’d carry it for a while. A few hours later, of course, something needed cutting and I embarrassed myself by pulling out this tiny dull knife to saw on a small hold-down made of plastic. I could have chewed it off quicker.

I remember his hands on me at my baptism when I was twelve, for he was my pastor as well as my father. After he immersed me three times, as is our tradition, he laid his hands on my head, as I knelt in the water, and he prayed for me. That touch is with me still, and that prayer is continuing to work itself out in my life.

Now, at the advent of this day, before I begin any list, if I begin a list, I’m going to bring water and stone to my father’s knife.

Love and Peace, Glenn