I hear it and forget it. I see and I remember. That's how I understand it.' - Confucius
When my father died several decades ago, I inherited an airplane.
Before you start wondering how many people the plane can hold and how it handles turbulence, I should let you know that the plane I inherited is the same plane that chops wood off the boards.
I also inherited a set of pliers, a handsaw or two, some screws, a set of clamps and bits, a yankee drill, a T-square, and several odd-looking tools whose exact functions I don't know. imagine still I think one of them has to do with raising rabbits, which I find odd, but biology has never been my forte.
My father was a very skilled woodworker. He made beautiful furniture, picnic tables, couches, cheeseboards and many other items from oak, redwood, maple and cacabola.
When I was home and not doing important things like shooting hoops or burning plastic soldiers, I helped my dad work on his latest project in the garage, although I use the term "help" very loosely. Most of my help was holding the ends of the boards or running to the hardware store to buy wood screws or a piece of sheet metal.
By the way, I say that I "inherited" my father's plane and other tools, but to be honest, I didn't inherit them that way, because I was chosen to take them out of the garage and make a good home. to find them With no other alternatives available, I packed the tools into a large box and shipped them here on Bainbridge Island.
They arrived a day or two after I returned from my father's funeral, all in good condition and undressed, which gave me a good idea of how to save on plane tickets next time. Southern California.
Since my dad's tools first arrived, they took a safe but quiet place in my garage among the various Pinewood Derby cars, my son Adam and I have about half a dozen boxes of Halloween costumes we've built over the years. baby clothes, Wendy says we'll find a use for them someday.
I might be sitting here today, not my father's hands, but human hands, if I hadn't noticed a class in the Bainbridge Park &Recreation winter catalog called Green Woodworking taught by Mike Ballou. I looked at the course description, thought about the tools in my garage, and before I could say "Bob's your uncle" and follow your thumb, I signed up.
Woodworking is a wonderful and very fun way to learn to use and appreciate the hand tools I inherited from my father. Baloo is a very knowledgeable and patient instructor in traditional woodworking techniques, and he won't laugh at you if you split one of your horses legs trying to pull out a nail you drove in at a comically wrong angle. That didn't happen to me, of course. I think the nail is broken too. Or a hammer.
Now, when I use my new woodworking skills and my dad's plane to smooth out a rough saw, or use one of his blades to cut a burr, I can't help but think that my dad is smiling somewhere and wondering why the latter. they have long appreciated the joy and satisfaction of using simple human-powered tools.
And if I ever find out what that strange wooden thing I found on my father's desk with a knob and two small pencils is, I'm sure I'll solve the mystery of the universe.
Tom Tyler writes a weekly humor column for this newspaper. This is his "Classic Files" from years ago.
