I never considered sharpening a knife to be a difficult task to learn, or teach. It's not brain surgery after all. I'm no genius, yet as a child, I had no problem learning how to put a shaving sharp edge on a knife with nothing more than a cheap government-issue sharpening stone. To say that learning how to sharpen a knife is too difficult is a cop-out that I don't except.
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I was taught that the worth of A MAN can be found, in part, in his level of self-reliance. I was taught that A MAN always strives to be as self-reliant as he can reasonably be. I was taught that self-reliance was a source of A MAN'S pride.
As a grown, reasonably intelligent, able-bodied man, I can't imagine the shame and humiliation of having to ask someone to sharpen my knives because I was too lazy or uninterested to learn how to do it myself.
But like I said, I guess I was just raised different.