Sawdust, sweat, and skinless airplane wings 

The wing of dad’s homebuilt airplane is stripped of its skin and lies upside down across two sawhorses. It’s what I see upon opening the door to the place where dad spends his time when he isn’t in the barn, eating, or sleeping. Even as a 12 year old, I know this workshop is where he recharges his farmer’s battery. He peers down at the exposed wooden bones of the wing’s anatomy like he’s the popular TV coroner in Quincy M.E. Each wingtip points down towards the plywood workshop floor in the gentle curve that gives the wing aeronautical lift when it’s right side up and supporting the fuselage. I’ve walked on the other side of that wing, being careful to stay on the black reinforced part as I clambered into the cockpit for our many after-supper flights. We’d take off from the grass landing strip in front of our farmhouse just to take a look around the countryside. But now the Jodel is grounded due to a little mishap. No-one was hurt, thankfully, but while the damage it sustained when it hit the ground a little too hard on a landing isn’t visible to me, the plane’s not currently flightworthy. For dad, it’s minor, just like cutting off the end of his finger is “just a scratch," and being laid out with sciatic “just needs a little chiropractic adjustment.” My talent for embellishment in my adult years could well be a response to his predisposition for the understatement.  

Truth is, dad’s pleased to have the plane back in the shop, because as much fun as he had in its construction, fixing it is better. Instead of a blueprint, he has to McGyver it. We don’t use that word yet, but that 80s TV show was made for dad or perhaps about him. Dad can figure anything out. He once not only realized he needed to use trigonometry and he actually knew how to use trigonometry. Horrifying to my teenage self a few years later, but at 12, still eccentrically cool. 

As I open the door, the odour of wood shavings is like a trip past the perfume counter at The Bay. That spicy yet dusty smell emanates from dad at all times and permeates sometimes through the house too, if he’s on a sanding frenzy. Then there’s the smell of his sweat. Dad is not a believer in hiding things that are natural. BO and cow manure: these are smells we accept as part of life. As I grow up, I’ll learn the social mores about this stuff, and will wish the rest of the world weren’t so hung up on sanitizing ourselves the way we do. Now, I don’t even think about it, just as I don’t question that his hands are always sweaty when he touches me at a square dance. That’s the only time he touches me, because we are English and therefore programmed not to need human touch. Dancing, however, requires it and therefore it’s OK. These are the rules. I neither make them up nor challenge them.  At least not for a few years. 

Dad leans over the wing, measuring tape extended. He makes a notation and reinserts the pencil behind his ear. Ten minutes ago, he came in from the barn so he’s in his work clothes. Mom has patched his jeans with a proper denim insert cannibalized from older jeans no longer repairable. His blue t-shirt has the beginnings of threadbare parts. He’ll soon make his biannual pilgrimage to Hayes Family Clothing in Wingham to replace his uniform - three new pairs of jeans and three new t-shirts. He varies the t-shirt colour between blue and green so he can spot the new ones. He’s ditched his work boots inside the back door of the house and his feet are now encased in leather moccasins the colour of sawdust.  Inside are pieces of orange and brown low pile broadloom. This is the stuff he’s laid throughout the main floor of the house, selected to camouflage the stains of farm life. Putting carpet in his slippers is one of those brilliant Peter Chandler ideas - you get cushion and warmth but you don’t waste time and money carpeting floors where plywood does the job. Aesthetics are never an issue for him. A socks-and-sandals man when it’s warranted. 

He’s hot - always - so the overhead electric heater is on low just keeping the wintery evening at bay. I see the ice and snow build-up on the windows that face west, north towards the barn, and east across the field to the neighbours. The accumulation is a reminder to dad that soon his playtime will be over and, after we eat, he will be back outside blowing snow, endlessly clearing the path required for the truck to pick up the milk the holsteins provide twice daily, allowing us the money for food and him the funds for these recreational pursuits. Just a few years earlier, his shop was in the cellar, windowless except for the one that became the birthing canal for the components of the plane. Decades later, old-timers will confirm the rumour that some crazy man had built a flyable plane in that cellar, despite its dirt floor and low ceiling. Being aboveground to keep an eye on the weather and standing fully upright were indeed luxuries! 

“Dad, supper’s ready,” I say cheerily. He’s been keeping an eye on the clock and has expected the reminder but he is not willing to waste even five minutes of time sitting in the kitchen while mom puts the final touches on the third cooked meal she’s prepared that day.

“Won’t be a minute,” he replies absently, pulling the pencil from behind his ear and jotting notes so he can remember where he left off the next time he has a free 10 minutes to get back to what he really loves doing. He follows me into the kitchen and we begin the evening meal. His heart and mind, however, remain with his skinless wing. 

___

Dad lost interest in flying shortly after he got the Jodel in the air again. He sold the plane first to my sister and her husband —  airplane people —  and then, after a time, they sold it out of the family. That was 40 years ago. In the last weeks, my brother, also a pilot, located it somewhere in Quebec. It’s no longer even potentially flyable - even dad would probably agree, were he alive to see it’s carcass - but my brother nonetheless reclaimed it as an artefact of our past. 

As my mother often says, “he was a funny, funny man.” And she was right. But damn, he was interesting. 

I remember him this weekend in particular. 

Happy Fathers’ Day.

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