When you have a tape measure, everything needs to be measured.
I have spent most of my life in a classroom: up before dawn,
falling asleep in a chair with a book in my lap, going to bed
so that I could get up before dawn and go to class to talk about
what I did not know enough about, yet. There was always more.
I loved the summers for two reasons: first, because I could get outside
and, second, because I could earn a little extra money doing carpentry
to help make ends meet. I cannot remember who called being
a professor "the life of genteel poverty". (I was not a high-powered
scholar. I was just a guy who was curious about too many things.)
I think that I have given a tape measure to each of my kids;
homemade kids, step-kids, adopted kids, grand-kids.
Many of them have also gotten tool boxes with a few essentials,
if you think being able to fix a few things is essential.
It might have been just a way of hoping they did not spend
all of their time in a classroom, and falling asleep with a book.
They measured everything. They measured doorways,
and their feet, and how tall they were. They measured hair,
and their hand-spans, and the dog, and macaroni.
When you have a tape measure, everything needs to be measured..
My grandfather gave me a hammer and a pail of bent nails.
In nineteen-thirty-something, grandfathers did not throw used nails
away. They saved them, and straightened them, and re-used them.
Grandpa Jacobson had not guessed that I would be so good
with a hammer, straightening bent nails, and driving them--
half a bucketful--into the chopping block. That was how
I learned how to use summers, driving nails, earning a life
outside of the classroom, and the chair, and the book.
When I was a bit older, I had guns. I had a .22 rifle,
and a .38 revolver once owned by the Seastrom brothers,
although I never fired it because I was told it was likely to blow up.
It was very useful in developing my incredibly fast draw.
No one ever got off a shot! Neither did I. In high school,
I bought a 30-30 lever action Marlin from someone
who lived up the road where Harold and Ruth lived.
I shot at posts and crows and knot holes and imaginary enemies.
I was somebody in a Zane Grey novel, a soldier in a war,
an innocent target of an evil assassin. I had guns. I was OK!
When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
When everybody has a hammer, everybody looks like a nail.
After Gabrielle Giffords was shot, two members of Congress
announced that they intend to carry a gun when they meet
with their constituents. Their constituents look like nails.
Maybe we should have a law that says that if you want to attend
a political meeting, you have to carry a tape measure.
I have spent most of my life in a classroom: up before dawn,
falling asleep in a chair with a book in my lap, going to bed
so that I could get up before dawn and go to class to talk about
what I did not know enough about, yet. There was always more.
I loved the summers for two reasons: first, because I could get outside
and, second, because I could earn a little extra money doing carpentry
to help make ends meet. I cannot remember who called being
a professor "the life of genteel poverty". (I was not a high-powered
scholar. I was just a guy who was curious about too many things.)
I think that I have given a tape measure to each of my kids;
homemade kids, step-kids, adopted kids, grand-kids.
Many of them have also gotten tool boxes with a few essentials,
if you think being able to fix a few things is essential.
It might have been just a way of hoping they did not spend
all of their time in a classroom, and falling asleep with a book.
They measured everything. They measured doorways,
and their feet, and how tall they were. They measured hair,
and their hand-spans, and the dog, and macaroni.
When you have a tape measure, everything needs to be measured..
My grandfather gave me a hammer and a pail of bent nails.
In nineteen-thirty-something, grandfathers did not throw used nails
away. They saved them, and straightened them, and re-used them.
Grandpa Jacobson had not guessed that I would be so good
with a hammer, straightening bent nails, and driving them--
half a bucketful--into the chopping block. That was how
I learned how to use summers, driving nails, earning a life
outside of the classroom, and the chair, and the book.
When I was a bit older, I had guns. I had a .22 rifle,
and a .38 revolver once owned by the Seastrom brothers,
although I never fired it because I was told it was likely to blow up.
It was very useful in developing my incredibly fast draw.
No one ever got off a shot! Neither did I. In high school,
I bought a 30-30 lever action Marlin from someone
who lived up the road where Harold and Ruth lived.
I shot at posts and crows and knot holes and imaginary enemies.
I was somebody in a Zane Grey novel, a soldier in a war,
an innocent target of an evil assassin. I had guns. I was OK!
When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
When everybody has a hammer, everybody looks like a nail.
After Gabrielle Giffords was shot, two members of Congress
announced that they intend to carry a gun when they meet
with their constituents. Their constituents look like nails.
Maybe we should have a law that says that if you want to attend
a political meeting, you have to carry a tape measure.
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