My Dad

I have just discovered that you can actually buy a potato peeler.
I was in a little Korean shop and found a lovely pink potato peeler. And thought of buying it. well. It was a first in my whole life.
I also discovered not long ago that you can call a phone number and people will come and fix your water pipes in the bathroom, and you have to pay for it, but it is easy.
Why are there such revelations in my life nowadays I am not sure. I remember when I lived with my parents we never bought things like potato peelers, and never called the repair people. Why? Because we always had my father there to make a potato peeler - he made one about 40 years ago, it is wonderful, shiny, and very sharp. We always had him to fix the pipe, the bike, the wall, the window, the furnace, the wristwatch, you name it.
So I suppose I had been conditioned all my life that things are to be fixed and made at home. I never did it as well as my dad, but still in my married life especially in Mongolia I have the reputation as Miss Fixit, I insulated the gaps by our door frame with plastic bags, "fixed" our sink with cellotape, glued our lightswitch to the wall so that it does not fall down, pasted the wallpaper back on the wall after the children tore it, used scotch tape to make the drawers of my sons wardrobe sturdier, secured the head of Buzz Lightyear with some wire, screwed back the legs of Batman and so on and so forth.
I am quite proud of these achievements of resourcefulness, although the end result is not always pretty. I know that I have an attitude that helps a lot when I don't know where to turn with problems like a broken pipe or an amputated Batman leg. I am proud of it because I learnt it from my dad.
Now that we live in Mongolia 6000 km from home, it is my mother only who enjoys the comfort of having a universal man at home, and she still does not know that she actually could buy a potato peeler. Or that strangers come and fix things for money. I pray she knows how blessed she is.