I held the nail, an 8d, in my
left hand, tapped on the head a few times with a very old hammer to set it in
place and then began to drive that nail through the plywood into a floor joist
just below. No easy feat for an up and
coming 10 year old framer. I’m sure it
was a knot in the wood, but that nail bent under my onslaught in 3 different
directions. It was NOT going to go in
without a fight. I lost. It was just easier to finish bending it over
and wail away until the nail was beneath the surface of the wood. If I were to guess a full 2/3 of the nail was
exposed and bent over. It
wasn’t holding anything.
Those of you who are a fan of this
blog and have read it from the beginning recognize that each one of my brothers
have referenced our father and his example to us. You might remember the article my older
brother David wrote about building Dad’s dream house. Well, this nail was supposed to be driven
into a piece of flooring on the second level of that home. More precisely in my parents’ bedroom on the
west side of the house, 3rd piece of plywood from the south west
corner of the second floor. Believe it
or not, that location is not an exaggeration.
I know this because of the struggle I had with that nail, and another of
the life lessons my father taught me.
“Are you going to just leave it
like that?” was all he said to me. I
didn’t know he was standing behind me the whole time. And truth be told I wasn’t happy about it. You see, my brother David had it right, I
didn’t want to be building “Dad’s” house at all. My friends were all out on their bikes
getting into all sorts of trouble and I wasn’t there to “save” them.
“It wouldn’t go in right” was my
lame response.
“It wouldn’t? Well it’s going too. I want you to straighten that nail and drive
it in properly.” Now keep in mind that I
could NOT pull the nail completely out to replace it with a new one. No, I had to straighten it in place. The tip of the nail had to stay in place
while I struggled to get the nail un-bent and straight enough to make another
attempt at driving it in properly. I
didn’t know the good swear words yet, but I was doing my best to make up a few
new ones. A tweak here with the claw
hammer, a nudge there, a few grunts and several hundred angry thoughts and the
nail was somewhat straight.
Fast forward 38 years. My two sons and I were finishing their
bedrooms in the basement. The older of
the two, who was just 14, was driving some screws into the drywall when one
screw hit something behind the board and went off on a bad angle.
“Are you going to just leave it
like that?” I said standing behind
him. He didn’t know I was there. And you guessed it, his response was the
exact same one I gave. “It wouldn’t go
in right.”
I lifted the hammer, and began to
gently tap the head of the nail. It
didn’t bend, much. Slowly it began to
creep deeper into the wood. My courage
began to grow as I hit the nail harder and harder. All it needed was one final blow. I lifted the hammer higher than usual…Dad
walked away with a little, albeit smug grin on his face as he said, “Better”.
My son, grumbling under his
breath, removed the screw, moved it slightly and drove it right home.
“Better”, I said.
___________________________________________________
Roger D. Laws is a Commercial Construction Superintendent. He has been a builder for the past 30 years. His completed projects include many homes and basements, a Walgreens, a dentist office, a rehabilitation center, a community living center and many others. He is an avid motorcyclist; touring most of the western half of the United States. Father of 6 children and 2 sons-in-law. Roger has a B.S. in Technology Management from Utah Valley University.
