One day a gentleman came to the orphanage and he talked with the head office and
they agreed to allow him to come in, every other week, and teach the children
how to do woodworking projects.
I remember the night, when I was 8 years old, when I finished my first project.
It was a small table with a Formica top and I was so proud of that table and I
looked upon it as though I had created a life. It was absolutely beautiful not
to mention it was the first time in our whole lives that the orphanage had
allowed us to use our own minds.
It had taken me six weeks to complete my project and I could hardly wait to give
my little table to Mother Winters, as a gift. Mother Winters was our head
mistress, the administrator of our orphanage. We called all of our female
caretakers "Mother" -- it was a title we used when talking to them.
As the table legs were not dry from the clear coating that had been applied, the
man asked us to wait until our next session before taking our projects to our
dormitories. But I was just so excited and happy I couldn't wait. Besides, my
woodworking project was the best one of all. (Except for this full size row boat
some ten year old was trying to build.)
I moved my table toward the doorway and waited for the right opportunity to
escape. Then out the door I went like a flash, running through the darkness with
my little hands underneath the table top, just smiling from ear to ear, as I
headed toward the dormitory.
When I reached the dormitory I placed the beautiful little table beside my bed
and I just stood there for about ten minutes just looking at what I had created
with my own mind. Then Mother Winters entered the room.
I pointed at the table and she smiled at me and I felt so proud. She asked me
where the other children were and I told her that they were cleaning up the
sawdust and would be coming soon. She walked over to the table and ran her hand
across the slick Formica top.
"It is very pretty", she told me.
When she touched the table leg she noticed that the leg was still wet from the
clear coating that I had brushed on earlier. She asked me why I had brought the
table into the dormitory with the legs still wet. I did not know what to say, so
I just stood there with my head down and I did not say anything.
"Were you supposed to bring this home?" She asked.
"No ma'am," I told her.
Mother Winters walked over to the little table and with her foot, kicked it over
onto its top. Then she stepped onto each of the small table legs, breaking them
off. She then opened the side door and had me throw the little table out into
the yard.
After Mother Winters had left the building, and all the other children were
asleep, I opened the outside door and went out to get my little table. There was
sand stuck all over the legs. I brushed and cried, and brushed and cried, and
brushed and cried but the sand would not come off. I hid the table in my closet
and I never returned to the wood shop after that, ever again.
About a year later I gave the little table and legs to Mother Henderson, my
houseparent, so she could throw them away.
About thirty years later I tried to find as many of the orphanage children as
possible in order to have a reunion, which we had in Jacksonville, Florida, in
1991. That's when I learned that Mother Henderson was living in Asheville, North
Carolina. Several weeks later I drove up to see her and we visited and talked
for about four or five hours.
As I was about to leave she asked me to come down to her basement and help her
get something important. So we climbed down into her dark, cold, damp cellar.
This shaking seventy-five year old woman walked over into a dark corner and
picked something up. As she turned around I could see that she was holding a
little table with four broken legs.
"Do you remember this?" She said.
I just stood there with my head down and I did not say a word. I could not speak
for fear of crying.
"Roger, I want you to have this." Mother Henderson gave me back that table that
so long ago I had given up for lost. She had keep it all these years, never
knowing if she would ever see me again. Her intention was to save the table
because she could not rid herself of the pain she remembered seeing in this
orphan's eyes. My inscribed name that I had etched at the bottom of the table
was still there.
Since then, I have sanded, clear coated, and replaced those broken legs. That
little Formica table -- that little table that was my first woodworking project
so many years ago -- now sits in my granddaughter Chelsey's bedroom, only a few
feet from where I sit now.
I look at that table today with bittersweet memories. I think of my heartbroken
disappointment at the time Mother Winters forced me to throw my broken table out
the door. But I am comforted and rejoice at the kindness of Mother Henderson who
kept that table as a remembrance -- never wanting to forget the story of a young
orphan boy who tried so very hard to please.
Roger Dean Kiser, Sr.
Trampolineone@webtv.net
Thanks to Heartwarming
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