Why? A child’s favorite question is “Wh
y?”. Everything in the world is so new to them; there are so many things to understand. My dad was a pretty smart guy. I always thought he knew the answer to everything. He liked tinkering in his workshop and reading Mechanix Illustrated, a magazine (about the size of my sisters and my copy of Cat In the Hat). Like the Cat, my dad had plenty of tools to help him do his work; if he didn’t have one he needed, he made it. There was a vice secured to a work bench, across the room from the door of the workshop (and one step to your left). It got used a lot. My dad was always using it to tightly hold a metal pipe or such which needed sawing. I remember tightening the vice with its shiny, smooth lever with knobs on both ends so it wouldn’t fall out of the hole. Tightening a vice is a fun thing for a child to do. You get to use two hands, each pushing in opposite directions (as hard as your little arms and hands could). One quick knock with a dad’s sized hand is best for loosening the vice’s lever. Then a young child can easily twist the lever to open the vice’s jaw.
Memories from childhood are nice to have. Thank goodness we are blest with brains to recall the past, function in the present, and dream about the future. Thank goodness for the smart scientists hunting for and finding solutions to help fight the grip the 2020 virus has had on our and all the countries of the world. It has been hard to understand all that has happened this past year. The children are not the only ones asking “Why?” Helping each other has to be part of the answer for where to go from here. There is a joke out there about 2021 winning. My not recalling exactly how it goes is immaterial. I just want to end by saying, I wish all of you will receive happiness, health, safety and a caring hand in 2021.