Generations

Tomorrow ( Dec. 6 ) is Melissa’s 25th birthday. The same age by the way, that we were, when she was born.

I’ve said it before as has probably every other parent in the world; “where did the time go”? I guess it was gobbled up by work, and school, church commitments, family obligations, yard work, car repairs, and bill paying. But it also was consumed with holiday traditions, school plays and concerts, coloring books, re-runs of M*A*S*H and Dragnet, ( Melissa and I watched those shows together faithfully when she was 2, every night after dinner ), reading Dr. Seuss, vacations to the Smokey Mountains, raking leaves, sledding, learning to drive, and mourning fallen gold fish.

Melissa moved to her new home in Cleveland Heights recently. It didn’t take long to move her in. At 25 most people don’t own that much. The few pieces of furniture she took with her needed to be refinished first. So we took her chest of drawers and dresser to a sandblaster who removed the old varnish, stain, dust, crayon marks, finger nail polish, and make-up.

The furniture originally belonged to Robin’s Grandparents. They gave it to her parents, who then placed it in her room when she was a child. She grew up with the furniture and it came with us when we got married. When we moved to “the new house” we put it in Melissa’s room. It is now in it’s 6th assignment.

Since it was being moved to Melissa’s house, we decided to refinish it as her 25th birthday present. It is amazing how different it looks. She chose a dark cherry color stain, and I used tung oil instead of varnish to finish it. She is picking out new hardware in order to “update” these fairly old pieces of very well made furniture.

As I finished it yesterday, I wrote a birthday greeting inside one of the drawers... Then I loaded it with a bunch of memories.