Knotty, Knotty

Dear Diary,

I went to get my taxes done and parked in front of an old shed at my accountant’s house.  Its weathered grey pine siding look for all the world to me like little eyes staring out of the darkness.  I was in that sort of mood, must have been the tax thing.


I was not, however, thinking in the least bit about my childhood home but that is exactly where I ended up going in my mind.  My dad had a “thing” about knotty pine paneling.  It was all the craze back in the early 1960’s and he paneled our television room and living room with it.


He also did my dear auntie’s television room too.  He had re-built her kitchen and finished off with the paneling.  He could build just about anything.  I never remember anyone coming to our house to do work.  He took care of everything, like rewiring and installing the new baseboard heating system.  He was amazingly talented.


Now, this post just demonstrates how, if we allow our minds to work like that, we can take a stroll down memory lane at any time even when we are not planning to.  The really ironic thing of this is that by training yourself to be fully in the present moment, like soaking in this old knotty pine wall, we open the door to the past.  Fascinating!


Extra photograph, Dad and little sister Kathy Toni reading the Sunday paper in the pine paneled living room about 1961.  One of the many afghans Gram crocheted is on the back of the couch.