As I have mentioned I had no brothers for my father to teach his many skills to. One of the things my father did very well was build things. He often taught me different things. I helped him with many things from a very young age. I can remember helping him build our "chuck wagon" which I may discuss at another time but not now. He and I made a "white picket fence" for my mother when we lived on Norview Avenue in Norfolk. My mother had wanted a fence and my father was the type of husband that went out of his way to do for his wife all that he could to make her happy. If he could give her what she wished he would do it. He sat at the kitchen table with me, a notepad and pencil and told me how to figure the necessary lumber needs as well as the hardware. Then I did just as he told me to do, he checked my figures and approved them. We got in the car and headed to the lumber yard for the purchase. It was so exciting for a me. I loved his trusting me to help him, I felt important and grown up. We purchased the lumber and headed home then spent the day in the garage with the measuring instruments, saws and sanders preparing the slats for the fence. He trusted me to make the measurements, angles, and markings. After cutting all the slats, it then, of course, took a few days to sink the posts, nail the cross bars then nail the slats in. We painted it white just as my mother had requested. It looked just as my mother has desired I was never so proud of anything in my life. That fence stood for a long time. It was still in place when we moved away to Texas.
My father and I continued with many projects over the years. Varying in size and skill level, I think the most notable project or the project I am most proud of is this:
This house is a house in Arizona that we lived in in 1975. Originally the room to the left was a car port. My father and I enclosed the carport together. Again we worked out the lumber and materials list while sitting at the kitchen table. The ride to the lumber yard was quite a bit longer as we lived 35 five miles from the nearest town and that was a little wide spot in the road, it was 70 miles to the nearest real town. So after VERY careful planning my father purchased the materials while I was in school. We built the walls flat on the drive way then stood them up to the sides of the car port and nailed them in. We measured and leveled them so meticulously so that when we stood them up they fit perfectly. My father was a perfect teacher. He always did his best. He always appeared to be happy with the job he did. He was always a happy man that gave 100% to everything he did.
You will notice there are two doors next to one another, the one to the right goes into the main house and the one to the left goes into the "game room" that once was the carport my father and I made into the game room. We did NOT do the electric work, we did hire that done because that is not something he could do and we were not stupid!. The room came out wonderfully. There was storage, windows and obviously a door. We put a pool table in there, little tables around the sides for games, snacking and sewing.
This photo was actually from google earth taken about 2012 and the room was build by us in 1975 so we couldn't have done too bad of a job now could we. The window to the right of the doors was my bedroom. The fence was not there when we lived in the home nor was the grass. We had sand instead. Lol. We raked the desert sand instead of mowing the lawn. Yes, that's a swamp cooler on the top of the house, too hot for air conditioning. No, those big trees did not exist in 1974. We did have a few Cacti though.
No comments:
Post a Comment