Gale Shelton is a man who will always be a legend in my mind. I grew up in a small rural town and Gale was a neighbor. I went to school with his boys and we all went to church together. Gale was a worker. That's what I remember most about him. He did a variety of jobs. No job was too big or too small. I can't really even give you a title. He just flat out got after it.
One title he did hold was the janitor at our church. I think the man showed up at 6 a.m. every Sunday. I remember thinking as a kid, "Who gets up that early on a Sunday?". Man, I still think that. I think Gale had his bed rigged to prop up and drop him into those trademark coveralls at 5 a.m. with a cup of coffee in one hand and a shovel in the other ready to get after it. He always was in his work clothes and always was driving an old van or truck that he drove about 90 m.p.h. down gravel roads loaded to the hilt with plumbing, electrical, carpentry, and anything else that you can imagine to fix whatever it was that needed fixing. You could call Gale for anything at anytime. I remember one time our stove went out in January. A blizzard had just hit and it had to be 3 degrees out. Gale showed up at 8 p.m. with an old stove he got from who knows where, converted it from natural gas to propane, helped me set it up, and hauled our old stove off. He charged me $50.
To me Gale was and still is an inspiration. This country has a lot of problems. I hear a lot of talk from a lot of people about what we should do to fix them. I haven't talked to Gale in a few years, but I imagine if he were president his stimulus package would be an alarm clock that went off at 5 a.m., the desire to serve others before yourself, and big match attached to our backside.
"...let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need."
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