For six years, customers had come looking for me whenever something needed fixing.
Dad had paid $9,000 for my small-engine repair training.
I never denied that.
But he reminded me of the expense whenever I asked for a raise.
He also brought it up whenever I helped eighty-one-year-old Otis Grim by repairing his riding mower and charging only for replacement parts.
Dad called it giving away labor.
I saw it differently.
Otis had been buying fence wire from our family since before I was born.
I wasn’t going to leave him with a broken mower over a small labor charge.






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