Carrying a pocketknife was common when I was growing up in the ‘60s and '70s. Not just among tradesmen or farmers but everyday Joes. Most men had one, and they posed no threat to the general public. Slip joint pocketknives were an essential tool. It was a “Dad Knife.”

Dad used it to clean and prepare small game and fish for cooking, pick splinters out, peel apples, sharpen pencils, whittle sticks into kindling to start campfires, open packages, trim the insulation back from electrical wire, and once to even start a 1970 Chevy pickup whose starter solenoid had gone out.

Guys who carried a pocketknife could do things — fix things. They were capable and self-sufficient.

As a child, I watched my father and his friends wield their pocketknives like surgical scalpels as they went about whatever task was at hand.

I couldn’t wait to be just like them and began petitions for my very own pocketknife at five years old. It didn’t arrive at Christmas or on my birthday a month later, much to my disappointment, as I knew my father and I were going on a fishing trip to South Georgia in March — and I needed a knife!

March came and we packed up the station wagon and headed south. Stopping in Cairo, Georgia, we entered a bait/tackle/hardware/grocery store for supplies. Few establishments like this exist anymore.

Traveling to South Georgia along this same route in the late '90s, I stopped in Cairo out of pure nostalgia just to see if the old store was still there. There was nothing but box stores now. What a shame. I’ll bet none of those box stores has oiled hardwood floors or a cat that follows you to the bait hoping for a treat or free coffee for any travelers — or, in the eyes of a six-year-old boy, the most magnificent display of Case pocketknives I had ever seen.

I was mesmerized by that display. I stood staring for a long time until my father came by and asked, “Which one do you like?” I replied, “Show me yours.” He reached into his pocket and held the knife out in the palm of his hand. I said, “One just like that.” He grinned and responded, “Well, mine is 4 ¼” long and might be too big for your hand to use it properly at this time.“ I thought if I was going to join this elite fraternity of "Men Who Knew How to Fix Things,” I sure wanted to use it properly…

My father saw the wheels turning in my head and said, “But if you look right above the one like mine on the display, there’s one exactly like it but 3 5/8” long and might be perfect for you.“ I could barely believe we might actually be doing more than just window shopping.

My father then called the shopkeeper over to unlock the case. The keeper handed the little stag handle pocketknife to my father to inspect. He turned it over in his hand a few times and then handed it to me and said, "Well, see if it fits your hand and you can open the blades. And if that’s the case, drop it in your pocket.”

I walked out of that store taller and with a confidence that only comes from a father trusting a son. And then two days later, I promptly cut my left index knuckle to the bone with a slip while whittling a stick. I wear the scar to this day, but in 62 subsequent years, I have never made that mistake again.

My father retrieved some bandages from the glove compartment of the old station wagon and cut them to size with his pocketknife. While wrapping my finger, he said, “Son, everything that is good in good hands also has the power to be bad in the wrong hands. Make sure you have good hands and don’t let this happen again.”

I took that at face value as a six-year-old. And it never happened again.

My dad, a decorated “Greatest Generation” veteran of the D-Day invasion, died way too early at 57 years old, but I remember his words and try to live by them. I realized in those early years that he was conveying far more than “Don’t slip with your knife.”

Sometimes I fall short, and sometimes in mundane and non-heroic ways I have good hands. The important thing is to try.

I suppose it’s a mystery to some how the simple notion of watching a father skillfully use a simple tool can have such a profound impact on later life, but here we are…

You can do it. Have good hands.