We read of a place that's called Hellbent, it's made for the fear and the free, that
you're still in God's word, he had it. How long did it take you? Seems like it was a long time. Well, I don't know.
Are you proud of this piece? Oh, yes. Yes, I am. Why are you proud of it? I don't know, because I've
forgotten part of it. I think he realized that he had the special gift. And when he put that
gift to use, he really saw it as an offering back to God.
It wasn't a highly polished cross that Jesus died on. My father was a big part of every church
community he's been into, but not because he stood up and said anything profound just because of his
character. He really exuded that joy and that love in his own quiet way. You know, they've been so
whole, and then all of a sudden, they're not. It just sort of rocks your whole world.
You know, I can't remember all the aspects of this. I'm sure I made it for my wife, Tini.
They needed some furniture, and my mother was all about buying it, and he was not all about buying
it. He said, oh, I'll just make you what you want. And she was like, well, no, you can't do that,
because you can't make it nice enough. Like that trunk he made me for the barn. I bugged him about it.
And then when I realized how nice it was later and how much time he had spent, I thought, wow,
I'm such a greedy little person. Most pieces he never signed. When daddy moved that sideboard in,
for instance, I said, did you sign that? Is there any way that people will know that you made it?
He's like, no. And I said, well, will you sign it? And I'm quite sure my bed's probably not signed.
Two generations from now, nobody's gonna know who made that. We're gonna go,
we're gonna meet Suzanne over there at the farm, and Rick, and everybody fuzzy. Perfect.
You know, he used to be a great storyteller. It's really hard now to get him to talk and put
more than three or four sentences together.
He is not the same person that my sister and I grew up with. But underneath, when you can see the
anguish in his eyes, he knows. So then you see the person behind all that, making him come forward.
The children that received the furniture, if they did not know anything about my father,
would be that he was as beautiful inside as that piece of furniture.
It wasn't that he thought, I need to do that.
It was just, that's the person he was.
What are you most proud of?
That we've got some things that we like to think are useful for some folks, and I've actually
seen them work out as useful things. That's all I can say.
