What A Man Needs....

I took three days off from work last week so I could get some things done around home. My primary focus was to convert a section of my workshop into a book storage, packaging room, and office for my part-time home business, Whizbang Books. For the past few years I have stored books and packaged orders in my house and in my workshop. It has been an unorganized operation. But that is about to change.

My shop measures 24ft by 32ft. A portion of it was an 8ft by 16ft storage bay with an overhead door. I cleaned out the bay, removed the door, and framed two windows in the opening. Then I insulated the walls and sheathed over the open studs on the inside with OSB plywood. It’s not pretty, but it was fast, and it’ll be functional.

My two youngest sons, Robert and James, helped me off and on. One day James was watching me and asked me this question:

Can you stand not doing anything?”

I wasn’t sure what he was asking. “What do you mean?,” I replied.

“I mean, can you stand not doing anything? You have so many projects. Could you stand it if you didn’t?”

My brain quickly absorbed the question, and I realized that my son has always known me to be an active person with numerous interests and projects. There are book writing projects, home improvement projects, Whizbang inventions, garden projects, and other homestead projects.

Then, out of the blue, I had an answer for him. A succinct and profound answer. That is rare for me. More often, I ramble on and on with my answers. But not this time. I said to my son:

“No, I wouldn’t be able to stand not doing anything. Do you know why that is?”

He said no and asked why.

“Because, and I want you to hear this carefully, James, every man needs three things in life. Do you know what they are?”

He said no and asked what they were.

“A man needs three things, son. A man needs a God to serve, a work to do, and a woman to love. Don’t ever forget that James.”

And that was it. I felt so wise. Now, I’ll confess that I didn’t come up with that on my own. I actually heard it from my wife. Isn’t that funny? She heard it years ago from a speaker at a home schooling convention. She thinks it was Mark Hamby.

So there you go. I really do think that sums up what a man needs. It’s something to think about. And, perhaps, someday you will have an opprtunity to share those words of wisdom with your adolescent son.