"Leap of Faith and into His Will" by Mary LaFrance

A few friends have asked me to start sharing some of the humorous things from my childhood and on. They have expressed that humor is needed so much these days, because of how this world has changed. There is so much more negative instead of positive things that is surrounding us all. Laughter is truly one of the best medicines, and in their opinion I’ve had a lot of funny things go on.

So I’ll preface this post by first saying that when my Dad was alive, he was a perfectionist, every time he did one of his Jack-of-all-trades projects. He taught me always to “Measure 3 times, and cut once” whenever we were building something together. When we would be roofing a house, his precision for laying things out first before beginning was an art in itself. Every roof we did was a beautiful piece of art. Every house we painted looked like Better Homes and Gardens. So much of his teaching flowed into my heart and stayed put, even now.

I had helped my Dad paint the house I grew up in twice, before the Lord called him “home” at the age of 64. I was only 15 years old, and right now you’re probably thinking, “How could Mary have helped him twice when she was so young when he died?” Well, beings that my brothers designated me to be the “tomboy” in our family, I started spending a lot of time outside with my dad from about the age of 4 years old. The two times I helped paint the house with him, my job was to paint the lowest boards on the house, since my dad was so tall and it hurt his back to bend over that low. I had my very own paint bucket and brush that fit my small hand. I had my own paint overalls and t-shirt, and usually I chose to go barefoot, because I hated shoes. With precision and patience, my Dad taught me the proper paintbrush stroke, the amount of paint to dip my brush in, when to repeat the process, and how to clean up everything when I was done. Often times, we would talk or even sing as we worked, and if my transistor radio had batteries in it, I was allowed to have it playing while I painted. My Mom always laughed when I had to take off my overalls because they had become stiff as a board with dried paint I had maybe spilled on them. One time I undid the shoulder straps and did a hand stand and had her pull them off from the bottom. She was laughing so hard she almost knocked me over 🙂 My Dad always checked my work thoroughly and if he saw any mistakes he would show me how to fix them and made sure I followed through…to his specifications.

Fast forward to the summer after my sophomore year in high school. My Mom decided that the house needed painting again. She asked me to help my stepdad get the job done. When she asked me about it, I looked down at the floor and breathed a heavy sigh. “What’s wrong?”, she asked. I didn’t want to tell her, but I knew she expected an answer. I said, “Well, this is the first time of painting the house without my Dad. I don’t know if Palmer (my stepdad), is anywhere near the perfectionist and painter that my Dad was. It’s going to be so hard Mom, but I’ll try my best.” She smiled and said, “Well, Palmer used to work for the government in South Dakota, and he painted many buildings as part of his job.” I tried to feel better, but I still wasn’t so sure about how this all would go.

My Mom and Palmer had gone to the paint store and picked out the house and trim color together. They came home and showed me the two colors on the paint sample sheets they had chosen. “Holy Cow!” was what I was thinking. The colors looked like baby calf poop and diarrhea. I could sense inside my heart, that my Dad was turning over and over in his grave! My Mom asked me what I thought about the two colors to which I replied, “I think I better keep my thoughts to myself.” She looked at me and could tell I was not thrilled by the choices.

The next day, I got up at 6:00 a.m., and started getting things ready in prep the house for painting. My dad had always taught me to powerwash the house and do all of the scrapping of loose old paint first, sand anything that needed it, let it all dry good, and then painting could begin. Palmer got up an hour later and started out to the garage to get the paint stirred and ready. I stopped him out on the sidewalk and told him the prep things my Dad said were always important first. He said that was a lot of work that he felt didn’t need to be done. Uh oh…”Houston we have a problem.” I went in the house and told my Mom about the little “chat” he and I had. She came out to the garage with me, and explained to him that she wanted the prep work done first. He didn’t look happy, so I chimed in with my two cents and told her I’d be happy to work alone, which I did. It took me two whole days to get it done, but I felt proud and could feel like my Dad was smiling down at what I had done.

Finally, the day arrived to begin painting the house. I felt like I needed to take some Pepto Bismal before I started because this new color was making my stomach feel queasy. I got both extension ladders out and put one on each side of the house. I told Palmer that I would paint the upper story of the house since it was so high. He wasn’t quite sure that a girl should be doing that, but I think he knew better than to argue. We had just barely started to paint, and I couldn’t believe me eyes and what I was seeing. Palmer had a gallon of paint opened, he dipped his brush in the paint, and walked clear around the corner to start painting! What in the world?” I asked him why he just didn’t take the gallon of paint over to the side he was painting so it would be closer to him, and he wouldn’t be wasting paint that he was dribbling behind him as he walked. He got so mad and said he had painted more buildings in his lifetime then I could shake a stick at. I of course, being a teenager, came back with a smart answer, “Well, I’m sure you’ve painted a lot of ground, but the buildings never got finished.” He stomped into the house to get away. I climbed up to the top of the ladder to start painting the peak of the house. My Dad had showed me how to rig up a hook to attach to the rung of the ladder that would hold my paint bucket. I was admittedly satisfied that I had gotten under Palmer’s skin, and was happy he had left the scene. About 1/2 hour ladder, I was about to experience an Abbott and Costello moment that I shall never forget. Palmer had gotten over being mad and decided he better get back to work. He was going to start painting the side of the house where I was, up on the ladder. He did not look up first to see that I was on the ladder. Yep, you’ve got it…he started to move the ladder that I was standing on! Good thing I was still at the top and had long enough arms to grab onto the edge of the roof and hold on as I yelled, “Stop! I’m up here on the ladder you old goofball! If I fall, my Mom is going to kick your butt!” He stopped dead in his tracks, looked up and froze in disbelief. He had sense enough to hold the ladder while I got down, and when my feet touched the ground he let go and went back into the house. I followed him in and there he sat at the dining room table, holding his head in his hands, crying and visibly very shaken. Mom came out of the bedroom and wanted to know what happened. I told her everything. I tried my best to console this broken man, but I was only making it worse. I went back outside, and started up the ladder again, this time with a different attitude. God was speaking to my heart, and letting me know that Palmer was a very different man than my Dad was in my life. Palmer was not a perfectionist, but was a gentle soul, just trying to fit in. I finished that whole side of the house, and went in for some ice water. Palmer and my Mom were sitting in the living room talking. I asked him if he would consider coming back outside to help me with the trim color around the windows. My Mom smiled and looked at him with an affirmative nod. I told him to paint the trim however he thought it should be done. I was going to go start on the next side of the house.

Two hours later, he came to where I was and asked me to come and take a look at the trim. I was scared in a way to see what my eyes would see. There before me was a job that looked amateur, but I held my words. I told Palmer that he didn’t miss a spot, and I would take care of getting any paint that was spilled on the windows or the main part of the house. At that point he said, “Your Dad must have been quite a painter.” All I could think of was, “If you only knew, if you only knew.” We eventually finished the whole house, and it took about 4 days longer than what I remember doing with my Dad. I was learning just how invaluable my time was in learning everything I could glean from my short time that God granted me with the amazing Erwin Schulze…my Dad.

After we finished painting the exterior of the house, my Mom asked me to help Palmer repaint the living room ceiling, while we were still in the painting mood. “Are you kidding me? Just shoot me now!” was in the silence of my thoughts. Of course, I told her, “Sure, I’d be happy to Mom.” My Dad and I had put up medium brown paneling on the living room walls a couple of years before he died. Thank goodness we didn’t have to paint the walls! I got out the tarps to cover the furniture and the floor which had good old shag carpeting. I brought in the 2 wooden step ladders and set up one on each end of the living room. I told Palmer that we should start by doing the edging first and we’ve have to really be careful not to spill water paint on the paneling. He agreed…hurray! But, before we could even begin, I had opened one of the gallons of paint, and set it by his ladder. He came out from the bedroom and stepped into that gallon of paint and it poured out like Moses parting the Red Sea! I jumped into action and saved a good share of it. Thank goodness my Mom was out doing errands, or maybe it would have been good for her to see just how things were going. I had gotten that cleaned up, and Palmer had moved his ladder closer to the corner of the room so he could begin doing his end of the edging. He grabbed his paint and missed the first step of the ladder, knocking over the ladder and the gallon of paint flew out of his hands and flew all over the paneling on the long wall of the room. He hollered as he fell, and my eyes got bigger than basketballs at the display of malfunction I was witnessing. I helped him up and told him to go sit at the kitchen table to make sure he wasn’t hurt. It took me another 2 hours to scrub the paneling and clean up the mess. At this point, I was literally thinking I must have done something really wrong to make God dish out this punishment. I was just glad to still be alive and no part of me had broken any bones.

Palmer and I agreed that he should probably just rest and he could supervise me painting from his easy chair in the corner of the living room. My Mom returned later that day and found me on the ladder with 3/4 of the ceiling completely painted. She was pleased as punch and said that it made her happy to see that Palmer and I had been working together. Ha! She had no idea about the workout I had and the antics that were an invisible reality she would never see. I finished the ceiling and Mom made me my favorite dinner that night, chicken with homemade stuffing, mashed potatoes and her homemade cherry pie with ice cream.

The last crazy and humorous thing that happened with painting that day, was when Palmer offered to help me clean up everything in the living room. He bent over to put the lid on a partial gallon of unused paint, and his top pocket of his overalls were filled with small paneling nails. All of the nails fell into that partial gallon of paint. He shook his head and just looked at me in silence. What more could I say? I told him this just wasn’t his lucky day, but I sure felt like Jesus was nailing my bottom for some reason.