We told KC he could put grampa's desk down in his room so he could study there...I think daddy would have approved. But first it had to be put back together.
When they tried to get it out of his den, there was no way it was going to fit through the doorway. I'm wondering how he got it in there. It almost felt like they had built that room around it. So after much deliberation and inspection of the desk, they decided to take it apart and take it out in pieces. This about broke my heart cause it seemed like they would never be able to get it put back together again like it was. I mean it was in quite a few pieces. They hauled it into the garage then upstairs in the garage a while later, and there it has sat collecting dust. So when KC said he would like to put it together I was really happy. I went up there with him and helped him clean up all the pieces. He vacuumed them off, then I wiped them down, then used some wood restoring oil on them. That really helped bring it back to life.
Found a cool old penny
The back of the desk still had a bunch of little articles and thoughts daddy had saved stuck to it. I pried them off the best I could so I could keep them. Sitting there reading them filled my heart with love for my dad. These messages he thought were important enough to cut out and stick where he could look at them every day are a pretty good description of the way he lived his life.
Some of these were too beat up to read so I'll type them in...
"Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. what we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; 'tis dearness only that gives everything it's value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon it's goods; and it would be strange indeed, if so celestial an article as Freedom should not be highly rated. "
Thomas Paine
"Learn from the mistakes of others...you can't possibly live long enough to make them all yourself."
"I expect to pass though life but once, If therefore, there be any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again." William Penn. Quaker founder of Pennsylvania.
This one had the first few lines missing, but I liked the rest of it...
"...and if thirst and hunger don't claw at your insides, and your back isn't broken, if your feet can walk, if both arms can bend, if both eyes can see, and if both ears can hear, then whom should you envy? and why? Our envy of others devours us most of all. Rub your eyes and purify your heart and prize above all else in the world those who love you and who wish you well. After all, this could be your last act."
Alexandre Solzhenitsyn
I think I must have inherited the love I have for collecting quotes and thoughts from daddy. (These are just a few of the thoughts he had...they were hung all over his desk and on the walls of his den. When we were going through his things, we found a few notebooks he had filled with quotes)
I have a big binder full of them that I have just kept adding to over the years. Whenever I see or hear something that speaks to my heart, I'll go write it in my book. Then when I want to make a new stitchery picture, I can thumb through my book and pick out just the right one. Sometimes I sit and look through my book, just to see these messages that make me want to do better or to just make me feel good. I've always thought as I collected these words of wisdom, that I want to try to live my life so that when I die and my kids are going through this book of quotes, they might say of some of them..."I can see mom's life in these words...I've got a lot of work to do.
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