January 21, 2018 – Family heirloom re-purposed

         A few years back I got into a discussion with a millennial when she was using the phrase “re-purposing.”  I asked her what that meant and she said she had found a vanity table and chair and was refinishing it and using it in one of her young daughter’s room.  I didn’t ask my burning question at the time: Then, what is the difference between refinishing and re-purposing?  In my younger days, when we found something that needed love in the form a paint job we considered it refinishing. But, at that time we also casually used the phrase “recycled” for getting more use out of an item that someone had cast off.

I kept my mouth shut and later checked out the “re-purpose” phrase on the internet.  I found the definition as: Something that is being re-used for a new purpose or in a new way for a new purpose.  However, one definition also stated, “without alteration.”  So, I felt the example above, the vanity table and chair being refinished was actually “refinishing.” But, I also learned another phrase, “Upcycling” which is converting waste materials or useless products into new materials or new products.  They now define recycle as break down and reuse component materials or to reuse as a whole.  So, the old phrase, recycled, still works for me in the ‘reuse as a whole.’

But, the above definitions shouldn’t side track us from a family heirloom that I now treasure and the little bit of history behind it.

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On the last two days of cleaning out my parents’ house last October with my brother, Ken, we dealt with Daddy’s work benches and the tools he used for a lifetime.  My brother, Ken, picked up a joint grooving tool that Dad had used in the 1950s when he was building the cellar with cement blocks.  The tool makes an expansion line between two layers of concrete blocks. 

“Do you know what this is?”

“It’s mine!” I claimed without hesitation and snatched it from him.  “It makes the lines between the layers of bricks or cement blocks.” Of course, he eyed me with the surprised look of ‘How did she know that?’

“I took bricklaying classes one semester,” I replied to his unspoken question with confidence and admired the smoothness of the wooden handle, the depth and sharpness of the v shaped grove making portion and then the raised lettering which read:

Miles Craft Tools

26A

Made in

Cleveland, Ohio USA

“Yeah, Dad used it when he built the cellar with the cement blocks,” he confirmed.

I repeated, “It’s mine,” and held it to my chest.  I instantly had a “re-purposing” use for it.  I immediately stashed it away before he could re-think letting it go without even a whisper of dickering for it.

Dad built our house from the ground up. The basement area was first excavated and then he put up wooden boards for the cement footings and when the cement footings had cured, Dad then started laying the cement blocks.  We’ve a wonderful black and white photo scrapbook of Dad working on the blocks with his two helpmates, my two brothers, Alfred and Ken.

Later that day, when we took a break from cleaning, we drug out the “building the house” scrap book which chronicled in photos and captions the land clearing, the cinder block basement, the capping of the basement, then the upper story, and eventually the roof.  Lots of pictures of the day the front picture window was installed with a cute sign, “it’s in!”  You have to realize, that is how the men coming home from World War II did things. They found a good piece of land and then they slowly started with the basement and built as they could afford.  My parents and my two older brother’s actually lived in the cement floor basement a year or so as the house was built mostly by my Dad from cellar hole to the tip of the shingled rooftop.

At the time my parents’ house, our house, was half-built, I was only a glint in my Daddy’s eyes.  By the time the family moved up stairs from the basement to living in the house, my Mom was well into her pregnancy with me.

Ken, looking at the pictures of him and his older brother being little helpers for Dad, turned and searched my face before he asked the question.

“Do you feel you missed out not helping to build this place?”

“No, I was here, remember, Mom was pregnant with me.” I said casually.

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Now about the fabulous tool I now own; my prized family possession that is already rusted and worn and ready for more serious hard work.  It is perfect for when you fluff up the soil and smooth it with your hand or a rake making it ready to plant seed.  You take this hand grooving joint tool and run it smoothly across the surface and you have the most beautiful, straight valley ½ to ¾ inches deep in the soil.  You can easily sprinkle your seed in the soil in the perfect straight line furrow where you can see and space the seed easily.  Then I just sift some compost/soil mix over the valley. Tamp it down with my hand a bit and violá – a perfect seeded row.

I put it to the test as soon as I got home from cleaning the house last fall.  I planted spinach seed and they have overwintered beautifully. Oh, how pretty they look in their straight row. I leave my 26A Hand grooving joint tool out on display, like a paper weight, on the top of the bureau I use as my seed packet and garden tool chest.  As I pass by, I sometimes just stop and pick it up and feel it's weight and the smooth handle warn by Dad.

Now, part of me thinks that Daddy’s joint tool is spreading his green-thumb  magic  in the seed bed as it makes that smooth valley helping my seed grow for me.