Of bed pans and other furniture

Sometimes when I am working in my shop, especially in the afternoons, my grandson Landon will spend some time with me there. Landon is four years old and all boy. He recently was prescribed glasses to correct a lazy eye, so he looks somewhat professorial. He is also a little on the chubby side, which is cute.

I have a few toys in the shop for when grandchildren stop in. There is a John Deere tractor and a dump truck. There is also a box of tools just for children to play with. Landon loves to take a piece of two-by-four and drill holes in it. Then he uses a screw driver to insert screws into the holes. He is actually pretty good at this. He also likes to play in the sawdust on the floor with the tractor, which has a board attached to it so he can grade the sawdust into roads. Sometimes the shop floor is riddled with sawdust roads that go all over the place and make figure eights and so on. Oftentimes, Landon begs me not to sweep up his work. Of course, I do have to sweep at some point just so things don't get out of hand.

Occasionally, Landon watches me as I work. This is especially true when I am doing something quiet such as changing a blade on the table saw or gluing up a piano bench or table. The other day I was changing the table saw blade to a dado. Landon was attending closely to what I was doing.

Then he said, "I watched you do that same thing the other day."

I said, "Yes, I'm putting on the dado blades so I can cut some tenons on these parts. The tenons will go into those mortises on the table legs there beside you."

Landon looked at the table legs that were lying beside him on the work table. "You mean these holes on here?" he asked, pointing to a table leg.

"Yeah, those holes are called mortises. I'll cut the ends of these boards here so they fit into those holes, and that is how the table will fit together."

"Hmm, I'm learning how you do things in the shop."

"Yes, you are, and one of these days I can just tell you to go over there and change that blade for me and you will know how to do it. Won't that be fun?"

"Yes, and you can sit in the rocking chair while I work." Landon seemed to think that would also be fun.

I had to smile at that.

"Well, I don't think I'm ready for that yet. Maybe I'll be doing something at some other machine while you are changing the blades. How about that? I enjoy working too much to sit in the rocker."

"Papaw, maybe you could build me a bedpan sometimes for my room."

"A what?"

"A bedpan for beside my bed."

"What, do you need to get up at night and pee or something?" I asked, surprised.

"No, a bedpan!" Landon said emphatically.

And then it dawned on me what he meant.

"Do you mean a night stand by your bed?"

"Yeah, a night stand. You could build me one for beside my bed and I could help you."

"Yes you could," I said, laughing at myself for misunderstanding what he was trying to say. "Yes you could!"

Landon wandered off to play and I continued working on my project. After a while I thought it would be good exercise for us to walk down to the house and get a drink of water. So Landon and I took off for home.

It was a beautiful spring day and quite enjoyable to be out and about. I noticed Landon wasn't keeping up with me very well so I slowed down for him. Looking around me, I saw the robins were out in force, each one listening for and finding earthworms in the ground. Overhead, a red-tailed hawk circled around and headed north towards Flint Creek. We walked on in silence, both of us lost in our own thoughts.

When we got to the house, we went in and fixed ourselves a glass of water. Miss Linda was there and glad to see Landon. After our little break, we headed back up to the shop. About halfway up our drive, which is a pretty steep hill, Landon said he was tired. I slowed down some more until we got to the top of the drive.

Not long after we got back to the shop, Landon's big sister, Annie, was at the door to pick him up. His mother, Jessica, and the rest of the family were waiting in the van. Landon was about to leave the shop, but I told him he needed to first pick up the toys and tools and put them away.

He quickly did as he was told and, just as he was going out the door, turned and said, "Bye, bye Papaw! I'll see you tomorrow!"

With that he was gone, but certainly not forgotten.

Sam Byrnes is a Gentry-area resident and weekly contributor to the Eagle Observer. He may be contacted by email at [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author.

Editorial on 03/23/2016