“A man needs a good pocketknife,” my dad once told me. More than once, actually. He said the phrase many times.
My first knife was one he bought for me in Germany. He had spent a few months there with McDonnell Douglas in 1977. I was six, and my first knife had a big fork on one side and a spoon on the other. I wanted nothing more than to use it at the supper table, and I did to my mother’s horror. It wasn’t long though before I saw the absurdity of needing another utensil to cut a piece of meat. I’ve been like this for a long time.
I ate pork-n-beans with it though. Even opened the can with the built in can opener. It had a bottle opener that I used some, and a big ol’ janky corkscrew that I wouldn’t even need to for years to come. It had a screwdriver and a file too. It was basically a worse Swiss Army knife with the added benefit of limited-use foldaway flatware.
I was a little older when he bought me my first real knife. Twelve maybe. It went everywhere I did. It was an Old Timer. Not super nice, but far from shitty. It had a locking blade and the plastic handle looked like wood and was finely textured with diagonal grooves for a good grip. Dad taught me how to sharpen it, and I kept it sharp.
The last knife he bought me was a Case. That’s the good stuff. I honestly don’t remember much about it. My wife and I were moving out to Oregon and the day we left, the folks were out of town. Dad called to tell me to swing by his house before we left. He had something for me on his dresser. I don’t remember much about the actual knife, but I remember the note. “Every man needs a good pocketknife. Keep it sharp. Also I want to tell you what my Daddy told me and what his daddy told him. ‘Any time you get four people together, one of them is going to be a son-of-a-bitch. Don’t be him.’ Good luck. Hope we get to see you soon. Love, Dad.”
I lost that knife in the crawl space of a house in Eugene. I had this damn job inspecting for termites, but the actual job was sales. Crawl through some old lady’s cobwebs and try to sell her shit she doesn’t need. I lasted three days. I would give anything to have that knife back.
I’ve bought myself several knives over the years. Always Case, like Dad bought for himself. I generally keep up with a knife for four or five years, then it will just disappear one day. God knows where they go. Then I’ll go buy a new one and get a few years older while it develops the shiny patina that one gets when commingling with change and cigarette lighters.
Maybe ten years ago I was in a knife shop and saw a style I hadn’t seen before. It was a Case, but it has this cool lever on the end of the blade and you can just kick the blade out with your thumb. The lever is handy for prying on shit and the whole thing feels good in your hand. It also gives me something to do with my hands. It probably looks like I’m playing pocket pool, but the god damned thing is better than a fidget spinner.
I really loved that knife, so when I lost it—right on schedule—I had to get one just like it right away. Well, we all know that the best way to find a lost item is to replace it. It took a couple of years, but I did eventually find that lost knife. I cleaned and sharpened it, oiled it up, and put it it my top dresser drawer, which for me is devoted to whatever treasure I own. Been that way since I was a boy. Socks and underwear go below all that, though I’m starting to rethink priorities in my 50s.
Dad passed away a few weeks ago. His health has been up and down a lot the last six years or so, but it was COVID that finally got him. It’s not a pretty way to go, as I’m sure many of you can attest to. We traveled back home after he died to get our funeral clothes and things, and I found myself looking through my treasure drawer, sort of getting lost. There was the knife.
“Every man needs a good pocketknife.”
The old phrase that I had come to believe in ran through my mind as I thought of my dad. I thought of him lying in that box in the suit we helped Mom pick out. Lying there with no shoes. Did you know they bury you in socks? No shoes. They’re too hard to get on your swollen feet. That’s just a nugget I have picked up recently. I thought of Dad lying there with no pocketknife and I thought it was a damned shame.
I stood over his casket with my arm around my mother. His pants pockets were hidden below the split in the lid, so I slipped it into his coat pocket. Every man needs a good pocketknife. I guess it doesn’t matter which pocket it goes in. I hope not anyway.
Part of me is like Dad, and thinks it would have been better to pass it on to one of my own boys. Practical. Like it was a waste of a good knife.
Part of me wants to believe in magical things. Part of me wants to believe in some sort of life after death. It would be nice, wouldn’t it? Part of me knows it’s all bullshit, but that other part wants to believe in ghosts. It wants to believe bad things come out of the closet if you play with that Ouija board. It wants to believe that the things I’ve seen were NOT the result of a leaking flue. Like prayer works if you really believe. Like God is real and Spot crossed a rainbow bridge and Dad is in heaven with that knife. Part of me wants to believe that Dad’s empty husk can feel that knife against his chest and it comforts him to know it’s there if he needs it.
Every man needs a good pocketknife, right Dad?
I had a dream last night. We were at Mom’s, moving things out. I moved Dad’s chair aside and saw that knife. I knew he had put it there for me. Then I found another one just like it. Then two more. They were for my sons. I don’t know what it means, but I can’t quit thinking about it. I’ll probably be purchasing three knives just like mine. I’ll stick them in my drawer. I’ll probably write the names of my sons on the boxes. I guess I should print this out to explain things.
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