My Dad

When I was five, my parents bought a wooded acre nestled in the Adirondack Mountains in New York State. The lot was your basic secluded, pine covered tract. What made our lot special was the ten foot wide right-of-way a mile down the road that came with it. That narrow strip of land gave us beach access to the twenty seven mile long lake across the street.

My Dad was a high school Industrial Arts teacher and very handy with tools. That first summer we owned the property we camped in a tent at a nearby camp-ground while my dad, my two older brothers and I built our cabin.

Mom stayed back home in NJ most of that summer to tackle her own projects that were easier done without three kids. Dad kept us busy. My brothers and I only missed Mom at dinner time. Dad was good at a lot of things, but cooking wasn’t one of them. His idea of dinner was Dinty Moore Stew heated in the can on the camp fire grate. And since no one wanted to do dishes, we ate the stew out of the can. Occasionally, Dad would shake it up and serve baked beans instead. It was a small tent for four people. On baked bean nights, it was significantly smaller.  

Working on a shoe-string budget, and out of a Ford Station Wagon meant we had to build the cabin in stages. Building supplies were purchased from discount suppliers a little at a time. We made frequent runs to the lumber yard.

I was only five, yet I vividly remember the day we nailed the plywood subfloor to the beams below; I knelt on the plywood next to Dad. He showed me how to hold a hammer. He showed me how to hold a nail. He showed me how to hit the nail and sink it through the plywood into the beam below. My brothers didn’t think I could do it, but Dad ignored their snide remarks. When I bent the nails, and I bent a lot, he showed me how to use the claw of the hammer to pull them up and then how to hit the crooked nails at the right angle to make them work. Shortly after, he left me alone with the hammer, a chalk line to follow and a paper bag of nails.

You wouldn’t think such a small event would shape a person. But it did. I have my dad to thank for my craftiness, my enthusiasm to try new things and my everlasting optimism.

Here’s to all Dads who give in small ways that make a big difference.

Happy Father’s Day!

Lisa