My dad was a body builder – of cars that is- He could take a car that was totaled and have it fixed and running better than it did when it was first driven off the lot.  I’d watch as cars that, without question, should have ended up at the crusher take a detour to my Dad’s Auto Body shop, “Cotton’s Automotive Service Center”.  Nothing was a lost cause. What couldn’t be repaired was repurposed. It was the hospital for cars  – and he was the doctor/surgeon/nurse on call.

He collected so many cars that others, including me, thought were junk. I remember going to the junk yard with him sometimes and watching as he smoked a cigarette and pensively gazed out over the sea of endless cars. I never ask him what he was thinking but what ever it was he was focused. Sometimes I would stand there and gaze out too and all I could think was how could anyone be here all day with all this junk! –  To my dad – a self taught mechanic- I could tell it meant something only he could explain.

The Lesson:

I like to think my Dad and I are the same in the aspect of building bodies.  I do Muscle competitions and his thing was building cars.

Unofficially he taught me that no matter how damaged or broken or unwanted a thing is, or how far long it’s been that way, – things can always be rebuilt.  There’s always the option of a comeback- Always a chance for a new  and better life no matter what happened. (Which is what jumpstarted me into body building but that will be a topic for another post!)

Did you find the same or another lesson in this?  Send me a comment tell me what you think.

Thank you for joining me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton