My Father, The Roofer.
My father, Reid Ribble, is running for won his election to the United States Congress in Wisconsin. I’m still growing up. I want to be just like him when I do. I’m married. I have a career all my own. I have two kids, a wife whom I adore. But, when I’m fifty and look into the mirror – I hope it’s my Dad I see smiling back at me.
When I was around ten years old – it really doesn’t matter how old, I was young – my dad asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I know it was around ten, maybe twelve, because I was old enough to actually start thinking about it beyond the scope of the immature childish dreams of becoming a super-hero or an inanimate object. (It’s possible to dream anything when you have no concept of time or space, or matter. Instead of a race-car driver, I was more prone to want to be a race-car). This was a typical father-son discussion, but it got serious quickly. Here’s why. I’m sure I said something like, “An astronaut.”
His response, “You can do anything you want. Be anything you want. You’re sure you don’t want to become a roofer, like your dad?”
“Yep.”
“Why?”
“Dad, I don’t like roofing. I think it’s stupid.” In other words, “I don’t like what you do. I want to do something that people respect.”
He could have been crushed. This was a family business started by his father. He had done it his entire life, and I’m sure at some level, he hoped to pass it on to his kids. But he wasn’t crushed. Instead he took the opportunity – seized it – and taught me something I will never forget. He sat me down, and with grace and the kind of quiet urgency behind his voice that cries in the calm, “If you miss this, I’ve failed as a father,” he explained.
What I thought he was going to say, (though I wouldn’t have been able to fully articulate it then) was that he had sacrificed his career options to take care of his family. That he had given up doing something really important, instead choosing to provide for something really important.
He didn’t.
He looked me right in the eyes, held my gaze and said, “Roofing is important work. It’s honorable work. We provide a service. It gives us a chance to do something with honesty, integrity, and standards. I get to come home every evening knowing that I worked hard and provided for my family honestly. We give other people that same chance. There are dads on those roofs taking care of their kids with honesty and hard work too. Never forget this. Roofing has given our family a place to live. It has given us food. And it has given you a future.”
It has given you a future.
Dad. I so want to be like you when I grow up.
There is little in our society that angers me more than classism. Classism runs in a lot of directions. If you skip college, take a blue-collar job, then you’re a degenerate who can’t succeed in life. You lack ambition. You lack drive and focus, and all you want is a handout.
If you’re successful, that’s even worse. How dare you succeed? That can only happen by taking advantage of those less fortunate. You’re a slave driver.
I’m frustrated by both views because they don’t recognize the common value of the individual. They’re insidious because the bigotry is acceptable in our society. Just find a group you fit into – rich or poor, or middle class, and secretly hate the others. Be jealous of the rich. Be condescending to the poor. Beyond the intrinsic value found in each human being, we all have our role to play in society. We can choose to embrace it and value others, or denigrate others and lose our value in the process.
This is where my father took the lesson deeper. He saw how much the roofing industry had provided, simply by rewarding hard, honest work that he wanted to give back to it. He donated his time, volunteered to make the industry better. He wanted to make sure that those who came after him, even though he knew it wasn’t going to be his own kids, would be left with a business model, industry, and more importantly, opportunity, that worked better than when he started.
My dad sees the value in providing for his family. He sees the value in providing a way for others to do the same. He sees value in the employee and employer, and wants both to be successful. Some people have called him “Reid the Roofer.” Some people mean it as a pejorative. Others view it as a term of endearment, representing the common citizen ready for leadership. I hope you see it as a badge of honor. I do.
So that is my challenge. Recognizing that whatever I’m doing, my work needs to be honest. My family is provided for. My “industry” is improved and I appreciate it. What we all do is of value on many levels. I can’t wait to tell my kids, “Roofing has given you a future.”
