Many, many, many (is that too many manys) years ago when Bob and I were first married I bought this writing desk. It was the first big purchase I made for our new home.

It was a mahogany leather top desk. I polished it and even used coasters for my iced tea and generally took extremely good care of it. It stayed in a that pristine condition for about 15 years. Then one day I sat down at my desk, just as I did tonight. The lighting was just right, the angle was just right, and as I looked down, something was very wrong. I started to sweat, and then I felt all blurry eyed, I was going into shock. There at the edge of the desk the wood had been horribly marred. I don’t know if I was mad, sad or just defeated. Did you ever have one thing that you tried to keep really nice and then to see it damaged, well it was just sad. Yes, that is the word, sad. I called Jill down to my office. “What did you do to my desk” I asked in the calmest voice I could muster. At seven she was perfectly composed and calm and replied very nonchalantly  ” I didn’t do anything to your special desk”.  Then I used my stern mother voice and had to start with the speech about how important it is to tell the truth, even when you do something wrong, that it is better to just come clean. Again she repeated  “I didn’t do anything to your desk”.  This went back and forth for a few minutes while I tried to get her to understand that I knew she did it and she just needed to tell the truth. She looked at me suspiciously and said ” how do you know I did it”.  So I stood away from the desk and pointed to the carving.

Because my little master woodworker, you carved you own name into the desk! With that she looked stunned and then said ” OK, fine I did it”, but it is a writing desk so I wrote on it”.  If only all the criminal master minds would confess so easily when confronted with such overhwelming evidence. Just fess up like Jill.

Now I have to tell you that I sit at this desk everyday and I haven’t noticed the carving in years. But tonight, it was just the right light, at just the right angle and there it was. It is no longer my damaged desk but a piece of our family history (be it carved) and a good story to remind us of when she was little. By the way – she used a fork!

Faux Farm Girl

Annie