August 13th 2013:
An amazing service at Rosehills Mortuary yesterday for my wonderful father-in-law Lloyd Wirtjes.
A fitting tribute to a great man who meant so much to me on so many levels. I was thinking about the huge shoes that he left for us to fill, but it occurred to me that he did not leave empty shoes. He left many, many tools for us to use to carry on the work. Anyone who knew him knew that he had a huge shop with tons of tools! Not just a drill, five drills, a couple drill presses and that’s probably not the entire list even in the drill department!
Much more important…he left real tools for us. Tools of everyday using and the everyday teaching of how to use them. The tool of being a good neighbor and all that it meant. The tool of being a good husband, father, grandfather, businessman, etc. Every time he came over to fix something at our house…and that was often… he would not only fix it, he would often teach about “how” he was fixing it and “how” I could fix it next time. Or…”how” I could fix the same problem for “someone else” next time.
John Vandenberg shared that the more the “gold-edging” on the pages of his bible got worn away, the more he discovered the “gold-mine” that lay inside! He said that a person who’s bible is “falling apart” usually isn’t! I love that line.
An amazing service at Rosehills Mortuary yesterday for my wonderful father-in-law Lloyd Wirtjes.
A fitting tribute to a great man who meant so much to me on so many levels. I was thinking about the huge shoes that he left for us to fill, but it occurred to me that he did not leave empty shoes. He left many, many tools for us to use to carry on the work. Anyone who knew him knew that he had a huge shop with tons of tools! Not just a drill, five drills, a couple drill presses and that’s probably not the entire list even in the drill department!
Much more important…he left real tools for us. Tools of everyday using and the everyday teaching of how to use them. The tool of being a good neighbor and all that it meant. The tool of being a good husband, father, grandfather, businessman, etc. Every time he came over to fix something at our house…and that was often… he would not only fix it, he would often teach about “how” he was fixing it and “how” I could fix it next time. Or…”how” I could fix the same problem for “someone else” next time.
John Vandenberg shared that the more the “gold-edging” on the pages of his bible got worn away, the more he discovered the “gold-mine” that lay inside! He said that a person who’s bible is “falling apart” usually isn’t! I love that line.