Mint Condition Designs was born a few months after a sudden death in my family. Last September we lost our patriarch: my grandpa. The upcoming holiday season had left us a little more humbug than anyone of us cared to admit and we decided to have a homemade gift exchange in an effort to feel a little closer to our departed. Mostly unbeknownst to one another, we all snuck around my grandpa's shop at different times creating little handmade gifts to exchange on our traditional Christmas Eve gathering. I had fabricated a several rings from coins years ago as a form of therapy while transitioning from military to civilian life, so I decided to give it another earnest go around in my grandpa's wood shop. The results were and continue to be tremendous, just like those hours my grandpa and I spent making birdhouses out of his scrap lumber for my daughters to paint.
It's much quieter in that shop without him, but the silence is deafened by the fire I keep lit in his old wood stove next to his work table. I've kept his work table exactly how he left it: a conglomerate of unfinished handmade projects littered amongst lathe bits, dremel attachments, and whole walnuts he was shelling for my grandmother's desserts. His lack of obvious organization always bothered me, but now I find it to be one of his most endearing qualities. He, somehow, always knew exactly where his 220 grit sanding drums were despite any amount of nut shells strewn about and he always put my grandmother's needs before his own.
While l don't miss the clutter, I certainly miss his advice. My grandpa had funny jokes and fruitful advice by the truckload. He taught me how to clean a catfish, mend a fence, make a mean corn mash, plow a field, and to be humble in the face of adversity. Above all, he taught me how to not cut corners; he always stressed the importance of doing the job right the first time regardless of who and how many were looking. While this often got me into trouble in the Marine Corps with Cpl Kelleher because it took me longer to sweep the floor than the other Marines, it's instilled a great pride in the quality of my work that I'm eternally thankful for.
We miss you, Pap. But we'll always keep our head down
and our chin up, just like you taught us.
Jimmy Pledger Boggs
Aug 17, 1942 - Sept 28, 2017