The founder of a small business wrote a story about his father's last, great gift to him.
The paper tore away easily and revealed a severely plain crate made of fiberboard and masonite, that bore no markings of any kind. It was nailed shut. I had never gotten anything delivered in a crate before. It conjured up images of turn-of-the-century archaeologists digging through excelsior to find some precious object buried within, like mummies in sarcophagi. My Dad just smiled and got up, a few loooooong minutes later returning with a small steel pry bar (Craftsman, of course.)It's a good story, though Eric may mock the Anglophilia on such open display.
“Careful, now,” was all he said.
It also underlines the concept of the Vision of Beauty, which in this case has informed a man's whole life and work. One thing that I notice from the story is how he never thought to ask just what it had cost his father, while the man was alive to ask: but now, as years pass, he wonders more and more about the sacrifice involved.
There speaks a man who has learned about making sacrifices of his own.
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