- 0
- 0
Apparently, we don’t actually use the word “cipher” correctly around these parts. Willie has always used it to mean “really thinking something through,” and I—being the supportive and linguistically flexible partner that I am—just assumed it was a Southern or maybe Appalachian cousin of ponder.
It’s not.
Turns out “cipher” officially means putting something into code or working through intense arithmetic. I suppose that math part explains how we ended up with our particular version. Around here, when that man starts “cipherin’,” I know I’m about to lose him to a long session of mental construction math. How many trees need to come down? How many board feet will the sawmill run through? Does he need 4x4s or 6x6s for those posts? How far into the ground will they go? This is not idle pondering—this is mental lumberjack algebra.
He can spend days, sometimes weeks, in this phase. Willie doesn’t just think through a project; he moves in with it, gets mail there, and probably registers to vote. Meanwhile, I’m over here with my little spreadsheets, thinking I’m doing something impressive, while he’s walking around with entire architectural plans and spreadsheets, complete with the individual calculating formulas, living rent-free in his head.
Then, one morning—usually without warning —he closes the imaginary ciphering book, pops out of bed at an unreasonable hour, and builds it. He might ask me about aesthetics, but let’s be honest, that’s mostly a courtesy. Whatever he’s been cipherin’ on is coming to life exactly as it was imagined.
This week’s example: a retaining wall east of the barn. The clay slope had been getting on his nerves. After a few quiet days of intense ciphering (and one suspiciously early bedtime), I woke to the rhythmic thud thud thud of posts being sunk into the earth. By the end of the day, the completed a fully built, stained, sealed wall, complete with drainage gravel which he ferried from the driveway like some kind of gravel Santa.
I’ve learned that when Willie starts cipherin’, it’s not a maybe—it’s a countdown. Somewhere between “hmm” and “aha,” the man’s already halfway through the build in his head. I’ve learned to stop asking what he’s building and just make sure I know where the extension cords are. Cipherin’ is his love language, and construction is how he says “Good morning.”