Before me lies a block of marble.
It is not mine.
It fell off a block of stone that I had shaped in my youth.
I was once a young and nieve scuptor.
I made mistakes.
Mistakes that now result in tears.
But, I have this block in my hands.
It is pure and beautiful.
I fear my mistakes, but I am no longer foolish.
So, I shape it. Gently working the stone.
Instead of cutting it to my will, I let the stone emerge into it's destiny.
My old hands hold the potential of youth and beauty.
Every day, the work becomes more my own.
Every day, the mistakes I see in my past work becomes lessons.
The borrowed stone shows me that my work is more than the sum of my past.
The stone is glory and greatness.
Greatness in me, and greatness in it.
The crowning lesson is that though I am a grandfather raising his grandson, I am still a father, and he is still my son.
No one under the stars can change that.
