In which activity do you pay tribute to the one who taught you how?
My friend informs me that the most obnoxious phrase in my lexicon is ”Let me tell/show you how the big boys do it.”
There are acts we perform we cannot unattach from the memory of the man who taught us it and a certainty that we know how to do it
correctly.
Hitting a golf ball, digging a hole, parking a car, loading a gun, planing a board and casting a lure are all activities that have me
channelling a mentor.
What do you do that is forever a tribute to a teacher?
Read more Advice & Confessions.
A young father teaches his young son to play guitar image courtesy of Shutterstock
About J. A. Drew Diaz
In the space of a couple of years I lost one hero and found to people who shaped my formative years.
My father died not long before my 10th birthday. He was one of the first people to recieve a heart valve in the UK. An operation that left him on various medications and vulnerable to infection. In truth, I don;t know much about it all. One day he was here, the next he was gone.
Shortly after his death I found Bruce Lee. It was bittersweet. Here was an invincible man, unlike anyone I had ever seen before. Only problem, he was dead. That initial introduction to martial arts brought me to the doorstep of Ronnie Watt, now an 8th Dan in Shotokan Karate.
Sensei Watt turned out to be more influential than he will ever know. He encouraged my timid efforts from day one. He let me train whenever I could often waiving fees and even gave me a Karate Gi when I had outgrown my first one.
He taught me to turn up and apply myself. He encouraged me every step of the way. Even though I dropped Shotokan as a teenager in favour of trying other arts it was his energy, enthusiasm and generosity that informed me the most.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronnie_Watt
@Rannoch- Oho… I was thinking small and here you go with a whole life…
Overachieving commenters
Driving. If my dad were a superhero we wouldn’t need a DMV. I admire this about him, but I also know that, while it’s bad to drive aggressively, driving defensively makes you angry/aggressive at the offensive drivers. It wasn’t until I rear-ended someone, and saw him sincerely more happy that I was ok than disappointed, that I understood it really was about getting there intact rather than on time and in line.
The guy who taught me to drive just told me to drive one afternoon as he was tired. So I drove a standard tranny F350 with a trailer uphill, maybe 15 miles to the yard. He figured I could do it because I watched what he did & didn’t really care that I was a year away from being eligible for a learners permit. My children F around with their phones while I drive and can’t drive a stick.
My mother taught me to drive. I don’t know how we managed. My father was away at a training for weeks, and I had made a snap decision to stay in town for college, requiring that I hurry up and learn to drive myself to school. I learned on a standard. I still prefer to own a standard transmission.
I’ve learned to play the organ from my grandfather, so whenever I look at sheet music, I hear his voice saying, “Every Good Boy Does Fine.” I remembered from his lessons that where you start out on the keyboard is important, because you have to plan for where you’re going to want to be next, and applied it in Mrs. Brown’s typing class. Being able to type has been the single most valuable skill, even more than being able to drive stick or sight read music. I’ve gotten work based on my typing speed, but most of all, I can “write” legibly and nearly as fast as I can formulate sentences. Sometimes I’m still typing the end of a sentence while “listening” to my husband, who has just walked up to tell me something while I was still unspooling my buffer through my fingers. It’s like a parlor trick.
In the course of my day I had the opportunity to discuss my concept of the “stick gene” which moved me a long way towards my belief that there is a very real difference between men and women and it is nature not nurture. The “stick gene” observation is based upon my Irish Twins. My daughter first emerged to walk the yard and picked up a few sticks and carried them or but them down with indifference, my son picked up a stick and wailed hell out of a bush the first chance he got, he jabbed the stick into the ground and found another and built a rudimentary something. My observations came about in discussing the emasculation of young men and their ultimate frustration arising from the dampening of the “stick gene” and that men cannot be fulfilled without expressing their innate “do” urge…..
You dudes are missing your stick genes- or something as prosaic as discussing what you do rather than expressing your deep thoughts and grand ideas is boring.
I mark a board for trimming by running a finger & pencil scribe and think of Ray Curry.
I put on a bandaid & think of Uncle Ed.
I sharpen and carry a pocket knife and think of my Dad who never carried a pocket knife but taught me to.
I load a revolver and think of Jim Keeling, born in a tent in a mining camp,where his father was the law.
I sight a rifle and think of Tom Kudrowski who learned the business in the SE Asia games.
I flick a zippo & think of a thug named Donnie.
I put a wrench on a bolt on a car & think about Cass Smith and breaking bolts.
I tie a knot and think of Frank Powdrell & Art Burbick- Scout Masters.
I trust a young guy and think about school disciplinarian Art Russo.
I coach wrestling and channel Marty Jacobsen, Lacrosse and think of Kal Wynot & Red Wylie, Soccer and that jerk I couldn’t stand.
I coached baseball and thought of that asshole in the mirrored aviators berating me.
I ease up on the clutch and think of John Evans as I do when I run any two or four stroke engine.
I plane a door & set the hinges and think of how much better at it I became than that smug Paul Bowles.
I foot a column of numbers on an AIA703 and think of Michelle Williams who taught me the term foot.
I love my dog without cutesy BS & baby talk and think of Victor Roggio.
I see a pitch fork and think of Victor’s Native American buddy who killed a red neck with one for trifling with his sister and then returned to the real world from prison to capture wild horses and build carriages.
if I ever nut another steer in this life I will think of Jack Stroh, similarly if I ever shoot another rattle snake I will thing of Jim keeling and if I ever roll a joint again I will think of Chuck Novack the Polish Pope.
If I ever pluck out a bartender’s eye I will think of long gone Jerry the Seal who I saw do that.
If I change a diaper again I will think of my Mother who taught me that chore and how to sew, iron, make stuffing & prepare a turkey dinner.
If I ever sing again in public I will think of Art O’Hanlon who wanted my early changed voice in choir and whose invitation fell on my deaf ears.
When I fold my shirt cuffs it is into my sleeves, more secure and safe from chalk dust as Bob Cressey taught me.
If I put my thoughts to paper, or keyboard, I think of the Real Ken Follett.
Here in the path of Sandy & last night’s no name Nor’Easter it is handy as hell to be able to fix stuff this week….
I’m working a major disaster recovery site in lower Manhattan, I’ve been getting paid for 40 years to make and fix stuff: but there is a competency amongst the men and women on this site that simply elates me.
Some words to cheer you from Camus’ The Plague
“We learn in times of pestilence … there are more things to admire in men than to despise.”
I saw a man today who I met 50 years ago. He was the older brother of a classmate and I was terrified of him. Today he is a tiny Buddhist, who led chants, at his Father’s wake.
I had reason to think of him last month when I had use for an axe on a stump; Mark taught me and Paul to sharpen a Boy Scout hatchet which he probably threw at us like Ed Ames…..
He showed us the file & whet stone method, I used an angle grinder and a belt sander– but I still honored him…
That’s good, how you found a way to get around your basic philosophical differences.
Yeah getting whipped on by a Karate fiend in the late 60′s was against my principles- other than Odd Job who the F knew martial arts? Oh right Kato, too. He was like James Bond in a dune buggy.