Done and Delivered

Yesterday I delivered the old dresser I have been working on. The hours of sanding by hand, cutting wood pieces to replace the broken pieces, and brushing with varnish has produced a beautiful heirloom for my daughter and her children.

This wooden dresser is fifty years old or a little older. The dresser was used by my parents when I was a small child. The dresser has traveled to many states, including being in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Texas. For years it has set in storage, without a purpose. Now the dresser has had a facelift, been restored for the use it was initially created.

The wood is oak, and of high quality. It is hard to find oak or any type of wood board that does not have a knot located in it somewhere. There is no knots in the wood used to create this dresser. Knots in wood are created when the tree puts out a branch. In order to get wood without knots, the wood has to come from the inner part of the tree trunk. There are not very many trees that reach the size before being harvested to produce wood boards without knots.

Like ourselves, this dresser is not perfect. The travels and life have left their marks on this old dresser. There are dings, scratches and stains that I was not able to remove without damaging the dresser to disuse. Each ding, scratch and stain tells a story, the story of life, the places and experiences. Each imperfection gives this dresser character, makes it unique and shows the strength of the dresser.

Our dings, scratches and stains show the same type of story. We have had experiences in life, some good and some bad. These imperfections give us in part our character, make us unique, but more importantly shows us and others our strength. We had the strength to endure, change, move forward and overcome, leaving an imperfection to give testimony to our life story.

This dresser being used by three boys will surely get more dings, scratches and stains in the coming years. But it will also carry a story of once being used when I was a child, how Granny restored it, and how it continues in their lives.