Dave, Retiree Extraordinaire

I don't write a lot about Dave because I know he doesn't really love that kind of attention. I know he's not super comfortable with being in the spotlight.

But I'm going to shine a light on him, just for a moment. Just for a blog post. If I may.

This is a guy who taught eighth graders for thirty years and loved every year, for god's sake. I know there are other people who taught eighth graders for thirty years. But I triple-dog dare you to find me one who loved all thirty years, right up to retirement. I mean, come on! Who does that?

Dave did.

He retired and proceeded to enjoy his new status as pensioner as much as he had enjoyed his teaching. We reveled in his retirement for about a year before crappy circumstances took over, and all the sudden our carefree "go see baseball stadiums" became "go see doctors". In these past three years of crazy shit-hits-the-fan crap, he's more than earned himself a Nobel Prize for Outstanding Human Being, an award which, in my humble opinion, should be created for the sole purpose of bestowing it upon Dave, a husband beyond par and imagination. The award should then be immediately retired, as the Nobel committee will not find ever again an equal or more worthy recipient.

I could go on and on and on regarding the millions of ways in which Dave, when faced with this unexpected crisis, rose (and continues to rise) to the occasion. But I'm not going to dwell on that  because I can hear you all (four of you) yelling, "More about Dave, not about the crappy shit!" as you read this, and rightfully so. Back to Dave.

So Dave was an amazing educator, yes, but he's also, it turns out, an outstanding and keen learner. He taught himself, from scratch, how to cut dovetails. And he practiced and practiced cutting dovetails. He made boxes. Dozens and dozens of boxes. Until he could dovetail so well that he could build furniture using dovetails as the joinery instead of nails. Not just any furniture. Beautiful furniture. Nicer-than-you-can-buy-in-a-store furniture, that will last longer. Pictures don't do them justice. He basically taught himself into becoming a professional-quality furniture maker.

But wait. There's more. You can only build so many dressers and tables and credenzas (I, for the record, can build exactly zero of any of these) before you need a new challenge (if you're Dave).

Chairs! Dave decides to learn to build chairs. Which means he also has to learn to become more than proficient with a lathe and a shave horse (look it up--not at all what you're thinking, I guarantee it). Not only does he teach himself how to use these tools, he actually makes one of them! This is a shave horse. Dave made one of these...

to help him learn to make this......

This is the first chair Dave made. THE FIRST ONE! Go ahead. Click and zoom. It's phenomenal. It's beautiful. Again, it's his FIRST chair.

It's not often you find someone who wants to learn something new and difficult, and who can simultaneously teach it to himself while actually absorbing and learning it. Think about that. It brings to mind a snake eating its tail as it tries to feed itself (just as a note, I am someone who really really does not like snakes or snake imagery but truly, it's the best representation of what I was trying to say about teaching and learning a skill at the same time so I'm using the metaphor even though I now do not want to read this paragraph ever again).

I am constantly astounded at Dave's ability to methodically, patiently, painstakingly, passionately build his skills (ha! pun unintended but wow! that worked out nicely). He is inspiring.

Follow with me here as I connect a few dots...

(POINT A)
Our kids are now adults, out in the world being grown-ups with jobs and rent and car payments and all the attendant responsibilities of being independent. It pains me to say it, but they "head home" after they "visit here". But that was the goal, right? I'm not complaining. I'm proud of them. But our opportunities for parenting, for setting good examples, for influencing our kids, are (rightfully) limited at this point.

(POINT B)
I think that one of our big goals as parents, what we really wanted for our kids as they grew up and went out into the world, was for them to have a never-ending passion for learning (whatever they wanted to learn), to always be curious about something, to always want to grow.

I think that Dave is the straight line between POINT A and POINT B in our family. Dave pursues learning every day in some way, he is endlessly curious, he is unafraid to grow and change, and our kids notice. As an example:

When Steven was home recently, he showed Dave a drawing of a bookcase that he wanted Dave to make. Dave saw an opportunity to hang out with Steven, and taught him to dovetail. Steven had never done anything like that before (also, it turns out, Steven is great at it!). The dovetailing lesson sparked an interest in helping with the bookcase project. And the two of them embarked upon a weeks-long build together, which produced this beauty:

I don't want to exhaust the geometry metaphor here, but sometimes POINT A and POINT B are just lone points, existing in isolation on the family graph. It is no small feat to connect the points, and I am so grateful for Dave's approach to life, for his inspiring example. For his strong geometry skills.