Rob - Male - United States » WIMKIN - Free Speech Social Media

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How true it is....

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Barrowed When the quietest kid in senior year picked up a two-pound mallet and started shaking, looking ready to put it through a window or a skull, I didn’t call security. I locked the door, turned ... View MoreBarrowed When the quietest kid in senior year picked up a two-pound mallet and started shaking, looking ready to put it through a window or a skull, I didn’t call security. I locked the door, turned off the band saws, and handed him a block of rough-cut oak. "Hit the wood," I said. "Not the world." I’ve been teaching Woodshop at North Creek High for thirty-two years. I have sawdust in my lungs and scars on every knuckle. I’ve watched this country change from the vantage point of a workbench. I’ve seen the boots get cleaner and the eyes get sadder. Back in the nineties, kids came in here with dirt under their fingernails, talking about cars and football. Now? They walk in like ghosts. Shoulders hunched, eyes glazed over, thumbing glass screens as if their lives depend on the next notification. They are the most connected generation in history, yet I have never seen a group of young people so profoundly alone. This semester is different, though. There’s a heaviness in the air that smells worse than burnt clutch. The news cycle is a constant scream of division. I hear them whispering before class, repeating the angry talking points they heard their parents shouting at the dinner table. They categorize each other before they even say hello. Us versus Them. The rich kids with the new trucks versus the kids on free lunch. The ones with the flags versus the ones with the signs. And then there’s the administration. They told me last week that this is it. The end of the line. Next fall, Room 104 won’t be a woodshop anymore. They’re selling the lathes and the drill presses to buy 3D printers and VR headsets. They call it an "Innovation Hub." I call it a tragedy. We are forgetting that before you can code the world, you have to know how to build it. That Tuesday, the tension was thick enough to choke on. It was raining, that cold, gray Midwest rain that seeps into your bones. The class was restless. You could feel the anxiety vibrating off them like heat off a radiator. I looked at the curriculum. We were supposed to be making birdhouses. I looked at their faces. A birdhouse wasn't going to fix this. "Put the tools down," I barked. My voice is like gravel, worn down by decades of shouting over planers. "Everyone. Sit on the workbenches. Now." They looked confused. A few rolled their eyes, but they hopped up, legs dangling. I walked to the scrap pile in the corner. I pulled out a crate of "rejects." These were the ugly pieces. The knots, the warps, the twisted grain, the stuff full of splinters that usually goes into the incinerator. I walked down the line and dropped a piece of ugly wood in everyone’s lap. "Look at it," I said. "It’s trash, Mr. Miller," a boy named Jason said. He was a varsity athlete, terrified of losing his scholarship, terrified of not being perfect. "It’s not trash," I corrected. "It’s honest. Run your hand over it." They did. A few flinched. "Rough, right? It snags. It cuts. It’s uncomfortable." I leaned against my desk, crossing my arms. "That piece of wood is exactly how you feel right now. I see it. I see the stress. I see the anger you’re carrying because your dad lost his job. I see the fear that you’re not smart enough, or pretty enough, or rich enough. You carry that stuff around like gravel in your pockets, and it’s tearing you up." The room went dead silent. The hum of the ventilation system seemed to get louder. "In the digital world," I continued, gesturing to the phones banned in their pockets, "when you don't like something, you block it. You swipe left. You filter it out. You pretend it’s not there. But in here? In the real world? You can't swipe away a splinter. You have to deal with it." I went to the cabinet and pulled out the sandpaper. Not the fine stuff. The 60-grit. The coarse, angry red paper that feels like rocks glued to a sheet. I tore it into squares and passed it out. "No power sanders today," I announced. "Just you, your hands, and that ugly block of wood. I want you to sand it until it’s smooth. Every time you push, I want you to think about one thing that’s making you heavy. Every stroke is a fight. If you’re angry, put it into the wood. If you’re scared, put it into the wood." "This is gonna take forever," a girl named Sarah muttered. She was the one who always wore long sleeves, even in May. "Then you better get started," I said. At first, the sound was tentative. A slow scritch-scratch. They were bored. They were skeptical. They looked at me like I was a senile old man clinging to the past. But then, the rhythm took over. There is something primal about manual labor. It bypasses the brain and talks directly to the nervous system. The sound grew louder. Scritch-scratch. Scritch-scratch. It became a drone, a collective heartbeat. I watched Jason. He wasn't just sanding; he was attacking the wood. His jaw was clenched tight. I knew his family was losing their farm. I knew he felt helpless. Now, he had something he could control. He could force his will upon this object. I watched Sarah. She was crying silently, tears dripping onto the oak, darkening the grain. But she didn't stop. Her arm moved back and forth, a hypnotic motion. She was grinding down the sharp edges of the wood, and maybe, just maybe, grinding down the sharp edges of her own thoughts. Thirty minutes passed. The air filled with the smell of oak dust—a dry, earthy, sweet scent that I will miss until the day I die. Sweat was beading on their foreheads. They weren't looking at each other’s clothes or phones. They were all covered in the same fine, beige dust. They looked like a team. The boy with the mallet—let’s call him Leo—was breathing hard. He had been the one ready to snap earlier. He had sanded his block so hard his knuckles were white. He stopped, panting, and ran his thumb over the surface. I walked over to him. "How is it?" He didn't look up. "It’s... hot." "Friction creates heat," I said quietly. "And heat changes things." I reached into my apron and pulled out a tin of beeswax and oil—my own mixture. I opened it and scooped out a dollop with a rag. "You’ve done the hard work," I addressed the class. "You took the roughness away. You faced the ugly parts. Now, look what happens when you treat it with care." I handed the rag to Leo. "Rub it in. Circular motions." He hesitated, then applied the wax. As the oil hit the wood, the transformation was instant. The dull, dusty gray exploded into a rich, deep amber. The twisted grain that looked so ugly before now shimmered with complex beauty. The knots looked like character marks, not flaws. "Whoa," Leo whispered. I looked at the class. "We spend so much time trying to be perfect, trying to present a polished image to the world before we’ve done the work. We want the shine without the friction. But life doesn't work that way. You are not defined by the roughness you start with. You are defined by how hard you are willing to work to smooth it out." For the last ten minutes of class, nobody spoke. They were too busy waxing their blocks, marveling at the hidden colors they had revealed. When the bell rang, nobody rushed to the door. They wiped their hands slowly. As they filed out, the atmosphere had shifted. The heaviness had lifted, replaced by a tired but genuine lightness. They weren't checking their phones. Leo stopped at my desk. He held his block of wood like it was a gold bar. It was smooth as glass, smelling of honey and earth. "Can I keep this?" he asked. "You earned it," I said. "It's yours." He looked at me, right in the eyes—something he hadn't done all year. "Thanks, Mr. Miller." I watched him walk out into the hallway, into the noise and the chaos of the modern world. He didn't look at his screen. He had his hand in his pocket, clutching that piece of wood. A tactile anchor. A reminder that he could change things with his own two hands. Next year, this room will be full of servers and plastic filaments. They say that’s the future. They say we need to prepare these kids for the digital economy. Maybe they’re right. I’m just an old man with a table saw. But I know this: You cannot download resilience. You cannot 3D print character. And sometimes, the only way to heal a fracture in the soul is to get your hands dirty, feel the friction, and sand it down until the true grain reveals itself. That is the one lesson I hope they pack in their luggage when they leave this place. We are not machines to be programmed. We are wood to be worked. And the most beautiful grain is always found in the trees that withstood the strongest storms.

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Rob shared

January 19, 2026 9:38 pm

Love this.

Sinister Midget shared a video

January 19, 2026 8:58 pm

Dating and Marriage Matrix

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Rob shared

January 19, 2026 1:38 pm

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January 19, 2026 11:18 am

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Wolf Track

Some of us have been addressing this kind of shit the government has been getting away with for decades and Taxes are the same way , all of it is ILLEGAL !!!

3

3 January 19, 2026

Rob shared

December 29, 2025 11:09 pm

Tony Minger

December 29, 2025 10:33 pm

Below is a letter that I wrote to a couple of my local representatives here in PA.... The reason that I'm writing now is because I read a couple articles that had me a bit frustrated as a voter and a... View MoreBelow is a letter that I wrote to a couple of my local representatives here in PA.... The reason that I'm writing now is because I read a couple articles that had me a bit frustrated as a voter and a tax payer here in PA. The 1st issue is what I'll address in this message, the next issue probably in another. The 1st issue is that I read about is where Pittsburgh's committee decided to vote to raise property taxes by 20% because they could NOT balance their budget. I will say that I don't live in the city of Pittsburgh so it shouldn't directly effect me right away but I'm sure that if Allegheny County decides to sue Beaver County again over not reassessing property values again because everyone is fleeing Allegheny, then it will effect me. Also I'm sure that state funding will be needed to subsidize the funds that the city may need in the future in order to pay their bills. My question is what is the responsibility of the board if they don't have to worry about balancing any budget for their city? The board refuse to cut back any of their unnecessary programs in order to balance their budget. Another question, "why don't they get audited and see where all their funding is going?" If a private citizen fails to balance their budget and they live beyond their means, they can't just decide to go out and steal from someone else in order to make up more money so they can go ahead and pay for programs that most people don't even know about. I took a brief look at some of their boards that they have on their site and it's crazy. It's understandable that they have an equal rights board...but they also have a board for LGBT+++ ( I'm sorry but I feel once you get passed the LGB then they rest tend to dabble into pedophilia because they tend to push agendas onto children). I'm sure that someone who truly has Christian beliefs may not want their tax dollars going to such a group that advocates for something that's considered a total blasphemy towards the faith. I feel that an audit should be done because what's going on with other major cities with fraud in these Democratic ran cities, it may not be a bad idea to run an audit in a city that can't balance their budget so they take it out on the tax payer. The 2nd issue, which will be in another email, is about another bill that just passed within PA by 102-101. That's the bill that allows for an abortion to take place all the way up to birth...and be done by someone who may not be licensed to perform such a task. I'm sorry, if you have an abortion then you should be made to have your tubes tied, unless it's a medical emergency or you have been raped. Most places won't tie a woman's tubes unless she has a couple kids but yet they will allow her to have a couple of abortions out of convenience? And on the tax payer's dime at that? Honestly, I can see attorney's, in the future, defending a murderer who murdered a pregnant woman, stating that "it wasn't considered a double murder because the woman has had abortions before and a fetus isn't a life".... I know that this is a Democratic bill but it's very demonic in the way it's laid out. I'm going to write this same email to a couple more representatives as well. I realize that it probably won't do much good and it's not you all's fault on what's going on but it is one that reflects mine and other's frustration with our system and how we feel helpless to stop what all is going on within our beautiful country. Thank you, Paul Minger

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Rob shared

December 29, 2025 12:46 pm

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Steven Halleron

Truth 💣

December 29, 2025

Rob shared

December 20, 2025 1:50 pm

Grab some tissues

Norma Meeker

December 20, 2025 12:04 pm

My father has been dead for exactly three hundred and sixty-five days, but ten minutes ago, my phone buzzed with a notification from his contact: “Check the toolbox. Combination is your birthday.” I ... View MoreMy father has been dead for exactly three hundred and sixty-five days, but ten minutes ago, my phone buzzed with a notification from his contact: “Check the toolbox. Combination is your birthday.” I froze. The phone slipped from my hand, landing on the cheap laminate flooring of my studio apartment. For a moment, the only sound was the drone of the refrigerator and the muffled sirens from the city streets three stories down. My dad, Frank, was not a man of technology. He was a man of cedar sawdust, engine grease, and silence. He typed with one finger. He thought “The Cloud” was a weather pattern. The idea that he had scheduled a text message a year into the future felt as impossible as him walking through my front door. I picked up the phone. The timestamp was 8:00 PM. The exact time the hospital had called it. I walked to the closet. It was shoved in the back, buried under a pile of laundry and unpaid bills—his old, battered red steel toolbox. It weighed a ton, a relic from a time when things were built to outlast their owners. I hadn't touched it since the funeral. I hadn't wanted to. It was a reminder of everything I wasn't. He was a union carpenter who bought a house at twenty-five and retired at sixty. I am thirty years old, drowning in student loans for a degree I don’t use, driving for a ride-share app that takes a forty percent cut, and living in a rental where the rent goes up every time the wind blows. I dragged the box into the center of the room. The metal was cool to the touch. The combination lock on the latch was rusted shut, or so I thought. I spun the dials. Month. Day. Year. Click. The latch sprang open with a snap that sounded like a gunshot in the quiet room. I expected tools. Hammers, wrenches, the chaotic jumble of a working man’s life. And they were there. But lying right on top of the tray, sitting on a bed of old screwdrivers, was a thick cream-colored envelope. On the front, in his jagged, all-caps handwriting: “READ THIS WHEN THE WORLD FEELS TOO LOUD.” My chest tightened. How did he know? He knew because he watched me those last few years. He saw me doom-scrolling on the couch when I visited. He saw the way my leg bounced when the news came on TV, talking about inflation, political polarization, and the latest global crisis. He saw me working three "gigs" and still checking my banking app with a knot in my stomach. I sat on the floor, my back against the radiator, and tore open the envelope. Inside wasn't a check. It wasn't a will. It was a single sheet of yellow legal pad paper, smelling faintly of tobacco and Old Spice. “Leo,” it began. “If you’re reading this, I’ve been gone a year. I bet you’re tired. I bet you’re sitting in that apartment, looking at your phone, worrying about a war you can’t stop or a bill you can’t pay. I bet you feel like the whole country is shouting at you, and you’re the only one whispering.” I wiped my eyes. He was right. That was exactly how it felt. Like I was running on a treadmill that was moving just a little too fast. “You guys have it harder than we did in a lot of ways,” the letter continued. “We had hard work, yeah. But when we came home, the world stayed outside. We didn't carry the voices of a million angry strangers in our pockets. You do.” “I can’t fix the economy for you, kid. I can’t pay off those loans. But I can tell you what I did when the noise got too loud. Look in the bottom drawer.” I lifted the top tray of the toolbox. Underneath, nestled between a heavy pipe wrench and a box of galvanized nails, was his favorite tool. A simple, wooden carpenter’s square, worn smooth by decades of his grip. “Pick up the square,” the letter commanded. “And pick up the pencil.” I found the flat, red carpenter’s pencil. The lead was dull. “Here is the secret, Leo. When the world is spinning and nothing makes sense, you have to find something that is True. Not a headline. Not a tweet. Something you can touch. Wood is true. Steel is true. A level line is true.” “Your generation is stuck in your heads. You’re trapped in the ‘Maybe.’ Maybe I’ll lose my job. Maybe the market will crash. Maybe the other side will ruin the country. It’s all smoke.” “Put down the phone. Find something broken in your house. A loose hinge. A wobbly table leg. Use the tools. Fix it. When you engage your hands, you quiet your mind. You reclaim your control. That is how you survive the noise. You build your own quiet.” “I’m not gone, Leo. I’m in the work. Love, Dad.” I sat there for a long time, the silence of the room feeling different now. It wasn't empty; it was waiting. I looked at my phone. It was buzzing again. A news alert: “Markets tumble as uncertainty grows regarding…” I swiped it off. Then, I turned the phone off completely. The screen went black. I looked around my apartment. I saw the kitchen cabinet that had been hanging crooked for six months—the one I complained about but never touched because I was "too busy" worrying about the future to manage the present. I grabbed the screwdriver from the tray. I grabbed the carpenter’s square. I walked to the cabinet. I checked the alignment. It was off by a quarter inch. I could fix that. I loosened the screw. I adjusted the hinge. I tightened it back up. The torque of the screw against the wood sent a vibration up my arm, grounding me. Real. This was real. I spent the next two hours fixing things. I tightened the legs of my cheap desk. I oiled the squeaky bathroom door. I hung a picture frame that had been leaning against the wall for a year. With every turn of a wrench, the knot in my stomach loosened. The anxiety about the "state of the world" didn't disappear, but it retreated. It was outside. I was inside. And inside, things were working because I made them work. When I finally put the tools back, I noticed something else. Under the carpenter’s square, there was a false bottom in the toolbox. I pryed it up. There were more envelopes. Dozens of them. “OPEN WHEN YOU GET YOUR HEART BROKEN.” “OPEN WHEN YOU LOSE A JOB.” “OPEN WHEN YOU FEEL LIKE A FAILURE.” “OPEN WHEN YOU’RE READY TO BE A FATHER.” And one small, heavy envelope at the very bottom: “OPEN WHEN YOU’VE FORGOTTEN WHO YOU ARE.” I realized then that my father hadn’t just left me a box of old metal. He had left me a survival guide. He knew he wouldn't be there to pat me on the back or tell me to toughen up, so he bottled his wisdom, organized by the crises he knew I would face. He understood that in a world that sells us convenience and anxiety in equal measure, the most radical act of self-care isn't a vacation or a purchase. It is the act of capability. The act of doing. I closed the toolbox. I didn't lock it. I walked to the window and looked out at the city. The sirens were still there. The lights were still blinking. The world was still messy, divided, and loud. But for the first time in a year, I didn't feel small. My father was right. We can’t control the noise. But we can always tune the station. I am Leo, I am 30 years old, and tonight I learned that the strongest inheritance isn't money. It’s the tools to fix what’s broken—starting with yourself. True love doesn't just say "I miss you." True love says, "I've prepared you."

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Nick Popescu

Beautiful lesson of Life! Where the true power and confidence come!

December 20, 2025