Small Marvels by Scott Russell Sanders

Author:Scott Russell Sanders
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780253062017
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 2022-02-08T00:00:00+00:00

Still brooding on the fractured fossil, Gordon was at his workbench in the garage one Saturday morning, deciding which of the many items on his list of household chores to tackle first, when Veronica slipped out from the kitchen, moving so quietly that he was startled when she said, “Daddy?”

He knew from the way she used her little-girl voice that she wanted to be sure he wouldn’t say no to whatever she was about to ask him. “Hey, there, hon,” he said, turning to smile at her. He noticed she was carrying one of her nature magazines. “What gets you out of bed so early on a weekend?”

“Well, I was wondering,” she said, twirling a finger in her black ponytail, “if you’re not too busy, could you make a little something for me?”

“Never too busy for you, kiddo. What are you wanting to make?”

“A bluebird house.”

“Expecting bluebirds, are you?”

“They’re due up here from the South any day now.”

“Then we’d better get them a house ready.”

Beaming, she opened the magazine to show him a photograph. “Here’s what it should look like.”

Gordon pushed aside his to-do list and spread the magazine on his workbench to study the photo. Veronica curled an arm around his waist and snuggled against him, as if she had forgotten for the moment that she was twelve years old. In no hurry for the moment to pass, he estimated the dimensions, calculated the materials they would need, and pictured every step in the project before he touched a tool.

Then the two of them set to work. Gordon ran the table saw, drill press, and sander, while Veronica specified every detail of the design.

Two hours later, the garage smelled of sawdust and the little pine house was finished, with a slanting roof, an entrance hole the precise diameter favored by bluebirds, every joint neatly fitted, every edge sanded smooth. One side of the box was hinged, so it could be opened “to check on the chicks,” as Veronica said.

After another half hour, Gordon had mounted the birdhouse on a steel post in a spot in the yard surrounded by scruffy grass, with an aluminum baffle on the post to keep snakes from crawling up, and the front of the box facing east—all according to Veronica’s directions, for she knew as much about bluebirds, Gordon reckoned, as he knew about bulldozers. She gave him a kiss on the cheek, another rarity at this stage in her life, and then she hurried inside to fetch her binoculars.

Gordon carried the tingle of that kiss back into the garage, where he found Mabel rooting around in his bin of scrap wood.

“What’re you looking for, favorite wife of mine?” he asked.

“That chopping block I bought at a yard sale, thinking you could use it to make me a knife rack someday. Since you’ve got your tools out and sawdust all over the place, I thought maybe you could make it today.”

“I bet I could,” Gordon said.

He was at work on Mabel’s knife rack when Jeanne, having heard the roar of the saw, came out to ask if he would make her a bookshelf next.

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