T. GAMBLE: Love of sharp objects runs in family

As a child at some point in my arrested development, I became infatuated with knives and hatchets. I watched a lot of Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett, and I guess the call of the wild struck.

I envisioned myself splitting a large oak tree by throwing a hatchet. I spent hours throwing knives in the ground to perfect the art of sticking them. Why I did this I do not know. I suppose it may have been a precursor to the many things later in life I would do without purpose.

I once went to the bottom of the hill below my house and began to chop away at a fairly large oak tree that grew on the edge of a ditch adjoining my father’s peanut field. Every chance I got I’d go back to the tree and chop a little more with my hatchet. I couldn’t chop all the way through but I was making progress. One day my father came in the house in a huff. He was cussing because the oak tree fell into the peanut field and he had to move it so planting could occur. I remember he was baffled as to why the tree fell.

“You know there hasn’t been any wind and the tree looked healthy,” he said. “I just don’t understand it.”

Well, I sure as heck didn’t tell him I’d been chopping away on the tree, and I guess he never found out what happened, at least not until now. Sorry about that one.

But now my 13-year-old boy has become obsessed with machetes. He has about 10, and he cuts up anything in sight. About a week ago he received a knife sharpener he ordered off the internet. I didn’t think anything about that really. Then he brings me into the kitchen, opens the utensil drawer, and says, “Look at those knives, Dad, they are sharp as a razor now.”

I now can’t butter my toast without great fear of losing a finger. He’s outside swinging that machete that’s sharper than a Razor Club for Men razor, and all I can think about is the very real possibility of the cat coming in the house with only three legs. I’m positive he’s just a few days away from a trip to the emergency room from a self- inflicted overswing wound.

I wouldn’t slice a tomato with any of the knives at my house if you paid me $50. If I run out of razor blades now, I just get a butter knife and shave.

I truly never imaged a day when my kitchen utensils would become more dangerous than driving around Afghanistan, but you’re more likely to lose a limb at my house than there these days. Earlier this week the boy genius decided to throw the machete at a tree. I guess he thought it would just slice it in two. Instead it bounced off, spun around and sliced my PVC water spigot in half.

A day later, and $100 broker, my water is now back on after having to cut it off to stop the gusher he created. Poor little boy, however, because unlike my father, I found out right away. It was hard not to with water shooting 20 feet into the air.

The 13-year-old boy now gets to machete the fenceline on the 20-acre horse pasture since he likes to chop stuff so much. I just hope the horse or donkey doesn’t come too close. I’ve heard it’s hard to ride a three-legged horse.

Email T. Gamble at [email protected].