compulsive compartmentalization

Nearly seven years after my dad passed on, I can still hear his voice.

“Don’t use ink pens with my straight edges…you’ll ruin them.”

My dad, a draftsman, had a large metal drafting table that we kept in our den when I was growing up. Unlike the more economically designed tables I see for sale today, it was cumbersome, spacious and bulky. It stood with two large drawers and an enormous green surface, tilted at the perfect angle, that called out to be drawn on. I would climb onto the tall metal stool and lean as far up as I could to doodle and sketch for hours on end. He had a plethora of triangles, rulers, and templates that I would use, especially when I went through my Transformers stage. More often than not, I would grab an ink pen and a triangle and set out to draw the perfect image until my dad saw the combination and repeated his line.

“Don’t use ink pens with my straight edges…you’ll ruin them.”

My dad was an extremely detailed person. If pictures were hung, measurements had to be taken, and it had to be level. He was the kind of guy that would read through all the instruction manuals before taking the appliance out of the box. Every template and triangle he owned had his named engraved on it. Just for good measure.

Everything had it’s place, and everything was kept clean. Using ink with the rulers would smear black all over their pristine (except for the engraving) orange surface. I suppose they were kept clean so he could see through them when he was drafting to the parts of the drawing the ruler covered up. Whatever the reason, he made sure I kept pens away from them.

A few years after dad passed away I moved into a new house that had an extra room big enough for my own studio. I inhereted the bulky mammoth table and it stands proudly in the corner of my room. Sure there are more economial tables out now. Relatively cheap with ample drawing space that take up far less room, but somehow I just can’t seem to let my dad’s table go. Too many memories attached to it I suppose. The forts I built under it, the time I fell off the the high metal chair and plummeted face first into the brick fireplace hearth. Ahh…memories. I intend to draw on it until it falls apart. Needless to say they don’t make tables like this much anymore, and I’m sure my children will have fun figuring out how to get rid of it when I pass on.

With the table I inhereted all the triangles, straight edges, and templates and have since disregarded my dad’s warning. I’m sure he doesn’t mind now, but when I put my pen to paper and grab the bright orange triangles to start inking, I hear his voice.

“You’re ruining my stuff.”

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 21st, 2005 at 10:24 am and is filed under Life, Memories. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.