A. My first “project”

I hadn’t thought much about this bookcase in probably 20 years. This past spring, I mentioned to my dad that I was thinking about doing some woodworking projects. Somewhere in our discussion he brought up the bookcase we had built together. It took me aback. I had completely forgotten about that weekend. My mom had been out of town when “we” built the bookcase together.  She had returned and been infuriated after seeing the bookcase and I can now see why. We hadn’t built a small bookcase- we had built an 8’ tall bookcase and stained it a color that didn’t match the other pieces in my bedroom. The bookcase you see in the photo is even missing the bottom shelf since Juan and I had to cut it off to shorten the bookcase to fit the basement office he is using.

According to dad, we had just used simple shelving board to build it. What did I remember most of the day? That for some reason, I couldn’t seem to stop myself from blinking every time he hammered a nail.  Dad had just laughed saying “You’ll get used to it.”  When it came time to determine the shelving heights, dad had left that decision up to me (I’m not exactly sure why). I had looked around, picked up a book, set it on the bottom shelf and told him “Above that.” As you can see from the photo, this idea didn’t work well since we ran out of shelves leaving a large gap at the top.

My parents have ever so slowly moved my brother’s and my stuff out of our childhood rooms over the last 17 or so years. Luckily for me, the bookcase was saved from the trash or Goodwill since it served a purpose for mom- holding her books and knick knacks that didn’t have a place in the rest of the house.  I guess it’s usefulness came to an end recently and dad made a trip with a UHaul to bring it to us.  The first thing I noticed pulling this bookshelf out of the UHaul- it is HEAVY. “That’s right,” dad said, “it’s solid wood. Not some cheap material you get when you buy a bookshelf at most stores.”  I am by no means a sentimental person but I could feel a little tinge in my heart looking at the bookcase. I don’t like the color of the stain, I don’t like the spacing of the shelves, but I’m keeping it.