All I wanted to do

We were watching a Detroit Lions preseason game and they introduced 4 new Pro Football Hall of gamers and they interviewed each one. One of them was a young man ( from my prospective) who's brother was already in the hall of fame and he was excited that they were the first brothers in the hall of fame.

He had played every game for seven years. He had a neck injury and the dr told him that he would never play again, so now he plays golf for fun. He said: “from a little boy I wanted to play football. That’s all I ever wanted to do. I played youth football, middle school football, high school football, collage football and when got into the pros I had what I always wanted to do”. My joy and my job was playing football and I am so very grateful for that opportunity.

It got me to thinking about my life, I might say all I ever wanted to do was fix things. A memory comes back to me of a lad at 7 years old. I had a platform that my brothers had built in the old apple tree in the back yard. I had dressed it up a bit by running bailer twine around the limbs about 3ft above the platform and hung old burlap bags for sides.

Dad had given me an old pocket watch and I couldn’t wait to take it apart and see how it worked. I took the back off and there to my delight were gears, springs and screws, a goldmine. I could see what was wrong, a little balance wheel that was supposed to turn back and forth didn’t. I could see it was supposed to because when I moved it, it would continue for 3 or 4 times and you could hear it tic tock each time. I loosened a screw a little and it would work longer. So I loosened it a little more and suddenly I had springs and gears flying all over the place. I thought to my self, some day they will say “he was always trying to fix things”.

Well I fixed tractors, plows, combines, fences, my bike, gates and the lawn mower. When I got my first job after the army at St Luke’s hospital mail dept. we had an addresograph machine that typed in metal plates that was used in patient identification and billing. Each nursing station had an imprinter used for patient orders. They were always in need of repair so we had to call a repair man and wait for him to fix them. I told my boss that if he would order two extra machines and allow me to order parts, I could fix and adjust them and always have two ready to go when needed. He agreed and we saved the hospital money and time and I was in my sweet spot.

so when my dad had a stroke and went to the hospital mom and I and Signe’ flew to Michigan and mom told me I should look for a job while we were there. I interviewed at about 8 different places and no luck. We only had a week and we were flying back on Saturday, on Friday I went to Miller Dairy Farms, I figured I could milk cows or maybe deliver milk. All I got was a dish of ice cream. As a last resort on Friday morning I went to the Addersograph office in Lansing and talked to the service manager. I told him of my experience and asked if he knew of any customers that might need help or if he might need a service man? He said no to both. That was my last hope so I left his office and got half way down the block and he came running after me and said Varityper needed to hire a service man. I said what is a varityper? He said, he will tell you about it, come and talk to him.

I talked to the Service Manager, he gave me a mechanical and electrical test that I aced and said we will call you in a couple of days. I said well I really need to know today because we are flying back to Denver tomorrow. He said to come back after about 2 o’clock and we will have an answer, we have to talk to the home office. I came back and they hired me. This was the middle of August and I was so excited to tell mom that I got a job and I start September first.

Setting here now I can say I always wanted to fix things. I give credit to my Heavenly Father for letting me do the work and then when I had done all I could do stepping in and blessing me with success. I am one who can say “do what you love and you will never work a day in your life”.