Having once thrown two leather clad legs over a Harley, reduced to one after a car making an illegal left turn took the other, this story resonates very nicely with me, and I hope, with you.
Couple starts leather-goods store with a Catholic twist
Dan England, (Bio) dengland@greeleytribune.com
March 11, 2008
Four years after they got married, Laura and Tom Hodge were traveling down a winding road with no real destination.
The marriage was a bit unconventional -- Laura was 20 and Tom was 40 when they met -- but it was like so many others, too. When their day started, Laura went down one path, and Tom went down the other, and it wasn't until the end of the day that they would meet again.
Four years after they got married, in 1988, they decided they wanted to spend more time together. They thought about a restaurant. They met in a restaurant, after all. She was a hostess, and he was a baker.
"But that's a good way to lose a lot of money," Tom said, "and there wasn't a lot to lose."
Then one day, they were out with some friends enjoying the weekend from the back of a motorbike when Laura noticed a tattered leather jacket.
"I'll bet I could fix that," Laura told her friend.
She did. So well, in fact, that their other friends began asking if she could fix their favorite leather jackets as well. Many of them were bikers who had a lot of miles and memories and life in those jackets and couldn't bear to simply buy a new one.
Twenty years later, Tom and Laura spend their days in Real Leather Goods, 330 18th St. in Greeley, bringing old leather goods back to life, adding some spice to others and spending their days laughing with the dozens of characters who walk through their door.
…It was a long, strange trip, but the journey wasn't over, and it's why you might do a double-take when you walk into the store and notice the Catholic goods in the corner also for sale. A Catholic biker store?
The combination isn't as unusual as you might think. Several Christian biker groups are thriving across the country.
Lampstand Foundation website, http://www.lampstandfoundation.org/
"The sinner is at the very heart of Christianity. Nobody is so competent as the sinner in matters of Christianity. Nobody, except the saint." Charles Peguy (1873-1914)
About
- David H. Lukenbill
- I am a California native, married, we have one daughter and live close to the American River with two cats and all the wild critters we can feed. I am a management consultant to nonprofit organizations and have an Associates of Arts degree in Administration of Justice from Sacramento City College, a Bachelor of Science degree in Organizational Behavior from the University of San Francisco and a Master of Public Administration degree, also from the University of San Francisco.