Tending shoes…

My dad had the same shoes and leather kit (in a cedar wooden box with a shoe horn for polishing!) all my life. Dad knows how to tend things over time!

I’ve tried to keep my grandfather’s pocket knife sharp and useful over the years, as a result! Not to mention his two fedora hats I inherited.

Tending things well is a practice of appreciation and thanks. Seems especially important in a disposable culture, in which we must replace our cars and computers every few years.

If we did that with our relationships, we’d really be in trouble!

A gift which keeps giving in every field for at least three generations—like an apple tree (like my distant cousin Johnny Appleseed tended) or anything else we get to tend across time-has memory and worth. We are temporary caretakers down here.

As they say in Texas, “If a person can tend one pair of boots for a generation or lIfe time, he might be able to manage a ranch, eventually.” Nice local parable. Anyway, enjoying trying to tend a few things well this season.

It’s never about the things, it’s about teaching us to care for what is given to us freely in life, as they say. Tend well, so you have more to give at the end.

Or, as my Cherokee ancestors said: “Tend the fire until it’s about to go out, and then teach carefully the next generation how to keep it burning. So everyone stays warm.”

I learned that much from watching my dad take care of his shoes.