The Inheritance Of Tools Analysis

In “The Inheritance of Tools” Scott Russell Sanders recounts his memories of his deceased father. Because most of his memories of his father center on carpentry, Sanders talks frequently about the carpentry tools that were passed from Sanders’s grandfather, to Sanders’s father, to Sanders himself (par. 2). Throughout the essay, Sanders uses the passing down of carpentry tools from generation to generation to symbolize the passing down of tools for life: passions, knowledge, life lessons, memories, and values. With the tools comes the knowledge of how to use them and the passion to do so. Sanders shows that he gained a passion for carpentry from his father at a young age when he mentions the crafts he used to create out of wood and nails (par. 9 and 10); and how he used to “make innocent blocks of wood look like porcupines” (par. 8). As Sanders gained the passion from his father so did he pass it on to his children who now also turn “blocks of wood into nailed porcupines” (par. 13). Even his teenage daughter still crafts things from wood occasionally despite not showing a huge passion for carpentry

Sanders remembers not only his father’s lessons, but even his exact words at some times, such as his teasing question if Sanders knew that his “thumb’s not as hard as [a] hammer?” (par. 1). He even mentions often thinking about what advice his father would give him on carpentry projects if he had been there (par. 26). Sanders remembers bonding enough with his father to be able to tell by his father’s humming whether he could be disturbed at the moment or should be left alone until the current task was completed (par. 8). And Sanders recounts his memories of his father always appreciating his work, whether it be awkwardly constructed models that “might have been anything but what [Sanders] had set out to make” (par. 9) or cities formed out of saved sawdust (par.