DUBLIN, Ohio — Randy Mercer is keeping his tools and mind sharp. He took up stone carving about three years ago when he retired.
“I was always interested in it when I was a kid and we would go to the cemetery to visit graves of relatives, so that’s how the interest started is way back then,” he said.
Mercer likes to carve Indiana limestone.
“All this stuff is primarily scrap limestone that wasn’t going to be used for anything,” he said. “It would be put in the crusher and put underneath roads so we get this out of a scrap pile.”
Each piece takes hours to complete, but Mercer doesn’t keep track of the time.
“I worked for 37 years and 64 days in corporate America, always marching to someone else’s deliverable, always someone else’s timeline,” Mercer said. “When I retired, I said, ‘I’m marching to my timeline’ so it doesn’t matter to me the length of time it takes me, as long as I’m enjoying the carving journey along the way.”
Mercer carves with a group of friends once a week at Scioto Park in Dublin, Ohio. He plans on gifting his current project to a friend.
