“I don’t know much but I’m pretty sure of this…” is a phrase my father Richard has said so often when I’ve heard him tell stories or teach. Both things he is gifted in along with another special quality I’ll mention here.
In light of recent Father’s Day, I thought I’d give a glimpse into a bit of my life with my Dad. I wrote in the Father’s Day card I gave him: Dad, you are my hero! You have taught me so much about God and the nature of our “with us ” God -Emmanuel.
I love to be with you. No matter what we are doing whether it is:
• eating
• laughing
• singing
• creating
• drawing
• playing the guitar
• constructing
• thrifting
• teaching
•repurposing
It doesn’t matter what I am doing with my father being WITH him is what I enjoy.
The other day we laughed as we carried things from the neighbor’s yard where scads of various items lined the curb. Because of an upcoming move they were throwing out a bunch of junk aling with some treasures too.
I helped my dad search these are the treasures we found:
• 100 DVD’s
• watering can
• small guitar amplifier
• collapsable stool
• Eureka vacuum
.• nice pieces of wood
He also grabbed:
• a bicycle
• a large piece of plywood
• a lamp
• a bike rack for behind a car
• truck tire and rim.
We hauled all these things home in waves and cleaned up the items that needed it. Some items have found a home already and others will be given away.
The next day we took a stroll, and I mean stroll, back down the street again to the same house where we grabbed another gem. Dad said, “We’re kinda like Sanford and Son, right?” The gem was a perfectly good twenty foot steel pole so we hauled it home.
I was wearing white pants with flip flops so my dad asked, “Are you good to go right through the yard, Rach?” I followed behind him carrying my share of the weight and length, he warned,” Careful it’s a little muddy here ya see, so I just go like this!” and away he went up the slight hill tromping through everything.
He continued to navigate as he lead me through the trees, plants and ground cover that lines the south side of my parent’s property. My feet began to feel cool because I was tromping on the leafy plants still wet from the buckets and buckets of rainfall we’d received.
We made it to the back yard and we lifted the steel pole up over the custom-built fence my dad made years ago behind our house. I stood on my tippy toes and pushed and held it there waiting. Meanwhile dad went around between the house and went inside his high wooden fence.
“Push a bit more, will ya? Okay, yeah, yeah, now I see it. Keep on a’comin!'” He instructed.
“Okay, Dad that’s it! That’s the last of it and it fits!” I exclaimed.
He told me he found table saw and jigsaw in the same find one time. He also said, “I picked up a lawn mower once at the dump I just pulled the rope and it started!”It probably hadn’t been sitting there too long. I’m not kidding, I pulled the rope and it started. I gave it to my brother and he used it for twenty years!”
I’m influenced so greatly by my father, like him I always experience “a thrill in the FIND.”
I don’t know much but I’m pretty sure of this..My dad is a master of salvaging things. He enjoys cleaning up, modifying and fixing things for his own use or giving them away to someone in need.
I love to be WITH him.
“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the father of heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” James 1:17 NIV
“‘My son, the father said, you are always with me, and everything I have is yours.’ Luke 15:31 NIV
Father God, thank you for the good and perfect gift of my dad, Richard. I know every good and perfect gift comes from you so I acknowledge you as the giver. And thank you with a full heart that I’ve had Time recently to be with him.
rachel inouye 