Poor Boy, Minor Key

My credo: give yourself a gift everyday.

Don't anticipate it, don't plan for it, don't expect it.

It can be an extra cup of coffee or a nap in your chair. It might be free, it might be spendy. It might be anywhere in between.

Don't worry about that. It will present itself to you.

I wanna pull on your coat about my victory night, my present to myself after changing out those struts. I got the ol girl all cleaned up, thinking about how I'm coming up on five years with this wagon. It's paid for now, so anything that goes wrong, hell...I gotta fix it. I'm invested. But I'll tell you what, everything I've had to do recently is well worth it...never, not once has it ever left me stranded.

I'm invested. I put in new factory floor mats, as if presenting fine lingerie, then I went inside and got cleaned up myself. Put on a decent pair of jeans and a shirt that was at least passable in today's fashion trends, and set off to take myself out to dinner. You know, sometimes I'll call myself up, ask myself out. One great thing about it is I'm always around.

I thought a good gift for the day would be to go to one of my favorite little bistros for a kabob trio of chicken, lamb, and tenderloin. Comes on a huge pile of yellow rice. God, I want to get a job there just to find out what they sprinkle on their vegetables...that and the garlic schmutz sauce, a dollop of which comes with each entree. Hell, I'd buy that stuff by the tub.

As I rolled along the showcase street in town, I admired the fact that I could now listen to music at a reasonable volume and understand what I was hearing at the same time I admired the million dollar homes that line the way. Huge stone mansions made for lumber barons...sorry, I'm smirking. Anyway, I pulled off the main boulevard and fiddled with the CD player while in the island waiting on traffic. When I looked up I noticed some raindrops on the windshield and I hit the wipers. Nearing the restaurant I had to put the wipers on intermittent. Rolled to a stop at the light right by my favorite coffee house and stared front, waiting on my green when it finally hit me.

Wait a minute.

“It's...it's raining.” I said to no one.

“IT'S RAINING!” I screamed to no one, but I'm sure was heard by the people on the corner outside my car.

I didn't know whether to shit or go blind, I just started laughing and calling people. I left one message that was evidently close to feelings recently expressed by the Double Rainbow Man.

The light turned green and the car behind me honked. I said “Go to hell, it's raining, don't you understand??”

Clearly they didn't. Another honk got me going, but the restaurant was only a few blocks away and I took my sweet time getting there. There was one tight parking spot open on the street...jackpot. I eased up and put it in reverse, getting ready to work my magic. I can move this ol girl backwards and sideways at the same time. The honking asshole passed by with an exhibition of acceleration that I'm surprised didn't rattle his car apart.

I have wined, dined, sipped and supped at some of the better middle to upper-lower-upper-class places you can find in the greater metropolitan area before I ran across this place. Now, it's one of my first choices. This joint is locally owned, and it has done well enough that they need a bigger space. There was a bit of a line, and the young woman behind the counter looked a little swamped. There's always a crowd here, right up to closing. When I finally got up to the counter she asked for a second and ran to the back to help the waitresses.

“Sorry...” she said trotting back to the front. She puffed her hair with “Kay...g'head.”

As I started my order she narrowed her gaze a little and asked if I had been crying.

“Wha...me? No. No, huh-uh.”

I motioned over my shoulder, “It's raining.”

She went up on her toes, her head poking over the display case like a little puppet. Matter of fact, she sounded like a puppet with the squeal she let out. She yelled to everyone in back about the rain, and they all came to the door and looked for a few seconds.

Blushing, she finally turned back to me and apologized for the rumpus, took my money and said it would be about 10 minutes.

"Don't worry, I did somethin' similar."

I found a two top over near the window, sat there without a book or paper, left my phone in my pocket, and I just watched the rain hit the street. Diamonds on the window. My dopey gaze was mistaken by a few college girls a few tables over. All I could think was “don't worry ladies, this dog knows when to stay on the porch...despite the rain”. I guess I must have looked pretty funny, when I realized what was happening I snapped back with a bit of awkward laughter and pointed out the window.

“Rain!” I mouthed, wide-eyed with a double thumbs up.

Thankfully the awkward moment was broken by the smell of grilled beast, wafting from the plate that had just been set in front of me. This...this is very special. I know I made a couple yummy sounds, but I didn't care. This was my gift. And then I got to thinking...you know I come here a lot. I mean...if you start giving a gift with regularity it becomes the norm. Right?

“Yeah, I think it does.”

It turns out this...wasn't my gift.

I climbed back in the car and got ready to get back into traffic when this song came on.

I felt so good, so good I started scooting around in my seat, signaling with the beat, and singing like I wrote it. Then suddenly it hit me. I knew what the gift was...and I went and got it.

This was the day. Go to hell, winter of 2010...you magnificent bastard.

And my time went so quickly, I went lickety-splitly...

The original plan was to go out and clean up the garage the night before I started replacing the struts. Instead I got home from work and ate an entire frozen pizza, washed it down with a pint of homebrew. Ended up falling asleep on the sofa with something forgettable playing on the television while thumbing through the Chilton's manual. Woke up at 2am to some bizarre infomercial...stared a minute...determined it wasn't something I needed and moved into the bedroom to sleep for the rest of the night. I must've needed it because I didn't wake up until one the following afternoon. So much for finishing the project in daylight.

The bench was littered with odds and ends of one sort or another, the one thing they all had in common was that none of them belonged there. I can tell you that it's one huge pain in the ass to try to get some work done if you don't have the right amount of space, even worse if you can't find a tool that you know you have. Getting everything ready to start working was going to be at least a half hour, but I was already behind schedule, so...what the hell.

Ratchets and wrenches covered by paper and fast food bags. Screws and nuts of all kinds and sizes. Some of 'em looked important. No idea what they're from. Manuals from stuff I had bought and installed 6 months ago. The travel mug Eric left in the car after our annual dirt worship. As I cleaned up I caught a glimpse of an old Polaroid picture tucked into the lid of my tool box. There's the old man, running a hose on somethin' at the Air Force base. Who knows what year, hell it's a damn Polaroid. It could be any time between whatever year it was he gave the camera to mom that Christmas morning and...well, whenever the thing quit workin'.

Everything I know about tearing something apart and putting it back together I learned from him...even if I didn't realize I was learning something. Standing there at my bench, I had to stop for a minute and look over the tools. I bought a Craftsman set of sockets when I moved into the house, those where hanging tidy in sequential order on the pegboard; it was the derelict sockets and wrenches that caught my attention. They were dupes my dad chucked into this toolbox he scored for me at an auction. Started sifting through, like going through a soldier's things, most of the sizing is barely readable. Grease from 1960 still stuck in the embossment. I picked up a boxed-in 9/16 (which you will NOT be using on a Subaru) and held it. It felt really good in my hand; natural. As I held it up to the light I noticed a mark...I knew that mark...there was a little chunk taken out of it near the end like a rotor or something fell on it.

I remember this wrench all the way back to when I was 12 years old, working on my Huffy in the garage.

I used it on all my cars growing up.

My first love affair with a car turned out to be an old '68 Mustang dad lined up for me when I was about 16. There was an old Fairlane in the driveway that he picked up at the lemon lot for something like $75. The engine was seized up, but he and I got it running. He lined the trade up because the Mustang was much more road worthy engine wise, but the floor boards were rusted so badly there were holes big enough to throw a cat through. Dad came home one night with a couple panels of sheet metal, a guy at the shop bent them in a way that was kinda close to what they needed to be. I did the best I could, I must've drilled about 27 holes in each, trying to find solid metal on the other side so I could get a pop rivet in there. I think I hit pay dirt 6 or 8 times. Called it good. Painted the interior with some sort of tar like substance dad found in a building on base. No idea what it was. I lined it all delicately...lovingly...with black indoor/outdoor carpeting.

Dad helped me with the torch so I could put a lift kit on it. I leaned on the wrench so hard trying to get that leaf spring bolt loose I rounded the head clean off. Dad says “that's ok, we'll cut through it.” He showed me how to get the gas mixture just right, when to hit the oxygen to blow away the slag. I crawled down underneath that thing, crossed my legs, and started heating up that old rusted bolt. I'll be damned if the first drop of slag that fell didn't go right down into my shoe. So the first thing I did was throw the torch so I could get up and start dancing around like a fool, the second was to say 'fuck' in front of my father for the first time. I did pretty good actually, it was just a small burn and my voice stayed in the lower register for the obscenity. The shoe was ruined. Dad was standing across the driveway with a grin on his face. I just know he was shitting himself trying not to laugh.

“Why didn't you tell me that would happen?!”

He then proceeded to explain that he did; there were all sorts of things he tried to tell me...but I didn't listen. And if I did listen, I wouldn't have believed him.

“Bet you'll never do that again.” he said in his trademark style as he passed by me, stepping over the wrench set laid out in a fabric pocket organizer mom had made out of a hunk of old corduroy pants.

Now this particular operation on the Subaru isn't hard, but its time consuming. Tiring. You spend a lot of time balancing, grunting, and blindly threading screws all at the same time. Once you get the assembly out you have to compress the coil spring. That's where the danger element shows up, if one of the compressors slips off, you've got thousands of pounds of pressure coming at you...quick. I remembered dad's line just as I took the nut off at the end of the strut when there was still just a little too much pressure on the spring...when that last little bead lost its grip on that last little thread it went off like it was fired from a gun. I heard it hit somewhere over on the other side of the car. I didn't even have time to react, I just stood there like a dumbass and then jumped about 5 seconds later. The flange landed at the far end of the bench and I'm still amazed I didn't lose the washer.

“Bet you'll never do that again.” I said aloud.

The first strut on both the front and the back took about 4 hours each. This was my first time doing this repair, and wouldn't you know it I have the model year of car that has the fewest helpful photos and illustrations in the Chilton's manual. So once I figured out what I was doing the second and fourth were no sweat.

I managed to spread my tools from one end of the garage to the other, another issue that hampered a quick finish. I can't tell you the number of times I went looking for the 14mm socket, each time saying aloud “I just had the thing...” One time I looked down and it was actually in my hand. All the tools needed a good wipe down at the end of the night, rolling around in the snow melt and grime isn't good for 'em.

I got everything piled onto the bench and started separating things out, getting everything polished and put away in it's spot. My feet were aching, my back was stiff, and my eyes had bags big enough for groceries. (Note to self: buy groceries). I was close to involuntarily shutting down, but I dragged my ass into the house and got a pint of beer. Trudged back out to the garage and leaned against the bench and drank that beer, just looking at the car.

When I was coming up and got in trouble dad was never far away. He never said no when I asked for help, whether it was a bolt I couldn't break loose or the piston hanging out the side of the block. It sounds strange...but suddenly I felt like I might have what it takes to be a dad.

I hung that 9/16 in the center of the pegboard, looked at it like it was the centerpiece of a trophy case, and turned off the lights.

The Loneliness of Lighthouse Keepers

The last time I checked in at Governor's was under a moon holding water. This time, it was giving me a sideways grin.

As soon as my right foot hit the faded paisley carpet, the bartender looked up and barked a greeting in my direction. Actually, he says just about everything in a bark and I reckon from the look of him that he's got the bite to back it up. I hadn't even sat down yet and he was already pouring my pint. He doesn't know my name, but he remembers my drink. Lord, I love this place.

It was the day after Valentine's Day, that marvelous invention to fulfill our need to buy some useless shit and bridge the chasm between New Year's and St. Patrick's Day when we can drink ourselves stupid and have an excuse...but it didn't matter because the décor here is prepared for all occasions.

There are cardboard cut-outs hung here and there via staple gun, the kind you see on your kid's wall at grade school. Hearts and cupids of course, but they share the wall with shamrocks and pots of gold, a turkey, and a cock-eyed baby new year that has long since worn through all but one staple in his top hat. The baby's feet move away from the wall from the puff of air that pushes in whenever someone enters. Top it off with a bar festooned with colored Christmas lights wrapped in a garland made of material I'm sure was banned in the 70's, and you've got a one-stop holiday hangover installer. It's very festive.

The only thing missing are the ashtrays. They adopted the indoor smoking ban early up here, and you have to be one hardcore smoker to go stand outside for a cigarette this time of year...and these people do it without coats in 5 degree weather. They'll have whole conversations, just standin' out there smoking like its goddam spring.

Boone was there, legs akimbo, perched on the corner stool. I get here about twice a month and he's always on hand; he lives in the neighborhood. The 64 bus, the same line I take to work, lets out right at the corner. Boone gets off the bus and then ducks in for a drink and to read the paper before he goes home, but tonight he had stayed longer. He was mid-stream in a PBR tallboy and a story about how winters like this make people go crazy.

“This should be good...” I thought to myself as I unzipped my jacket and parked across the corner from him.

The bartender is an ol boy called Lou. As I got situated, he swabbed the bar in front of me and roughly set down my beer, sloshing some onto the area he'd just wiped. Lou is kinda what you'd call a 'skinny-fat guy'. He's tall and lanky, but solid and broad chested. His pants go up higher in the back so the waistband can accommodate the belly that's sloppin' over the front. Rail thin legs, but thick Popeye forearms with a few faded military oriented tattoos. You know the type...he used to be really thin, probably an athlete, then let himself go. Puts you in mind of a sweet potato experiment in a mason jar on the kitchen window sill when you were kid.

I got out my wallet as Boone went back into his rant, tapping a Newport filter side down onto a coaster. He said “people tell stories, those urban legends, 'bout how a one room school house in the country gets snowed in, then the teacher goes ape-shit and kills the kids."

I pointed out that a one-room country school house is a strange topic for an urban legend.

"Put that one on my tab, Lou.” Boone said, directing me to the jukebox. I used the fiver there instead and he picked up where he left off.

“Butchered every one of 'em. They say if you go out there at night you can hear the screams. It's an urban legend, but that shit happens. And let me tell you, after the shit we've been through up here these past 5 months, there ain't a jury in this state that would convict the teacher.”

Lou agreed with a stifled bark and rolled his eyes. He says hibernation can be good, but like anything...'good' is best in doses. Believe it or not a body can only sleep so much before it starts to rebel; it gets to a point where sleep is all you really want, but your body says “screw you, I've been sleeping for months now, we're staying up”. You don't know which way is which and every time you wake up you have to figure out if its dawn or dusk.

Someone really put a nickel in Boone tonight, he was full of examples of people going nuts and doing unexplainable things. Short tempers ruining relationships. For the better part of a half hour he shared these stories with enthusiasm fueled by cheap beer. I didn't have the heart to tell him that some of the details from his stories were actually out-takes from The Shining.

“Going ape-shit is right.” Lou said, finally taking a break and leaning against the cooler as Van Morrison's An Evening in June came over the speakers. Boone looked up and gave me that “oh, aren't you cute” look.

“My uncle did a stint in the Coast Guard on the east coast, when he got out he pulled six months as a lighthouse keeper built on this little...turd of an island”, Lou said. His uncle fashioned himself as the independent sort, and didn't think the isolation would be a problem.

He held up one finger and kinda shook it, explaining that “isolation is one thing, going mental is another, and then there's being by yourself on an island...working your ass off to tend a light you're not sure is even necessary.”

See, lighthouses had become easier to manage by the time his uncle came on. This particular light was previously manned by three people even though the work could have been done by two; the third man's job was to keep the other two from killing each other if a fight broke out after someone suddenly lost their mind; snapping when someone says "pass me that wrench" wrong. Obviously that part of the job description was interchangeable, any one of the three might be called to break up a fight, however there was no contingency plan for a situation where two guys suddenly realize they've had it with the other's superior attitude...then what? With a bit of 1950's technology and some automation, everything could be monitored by just one person at this point.

The first people on the island to tend the light was a family; a couple in their thirties and their young daughter. Evidently their living quarters weren't finished, and they were staying in a wood shack that had been set-up nearby when a huge storm rolled in with high winds, snow, and temperatures colder than a well digger's kerblocken. The water around the island was frozen solid 50 yards out on all sides for three weeks with 15 feet waves beyond that, there was no getting in or out. They didn't have a radio. The little girl got sick. She died since they couldn't get help.

“My uncle told this great story about how the wife took their daughter to the mainland as soon as a boat was able to get there. She told him she would be back after she had seen to a proper funeral...get the kid buried and that. Obviously he had to stay. Days turned to weeks. Weeks to months. Months to the realization that she wasn't coming back. Before the winter was over, he had hung himself from the top railing just after cleaning the lens.”

Lou paused for effect, then his voice dropped way down. The bark softened to a deep murmur; that comforting tone a normally gruff man takes on when you put a baby in his hands. He added “Can you imagine that? He kept that light going...just hoping that the next boat was going to bring his wife back. Finally he realizes that she's joined the world, and is probably well out of sight of that light he's tending.”

I was expecting more, but suddenly he snapped back to himself and got busy with some glassware.

Boone piped up with a couple choice words and a rather incredulous response to Lou's uncle's wife leaving him on that frozen rock.

Lou exhaled heavily and then corrected him. "No dipshit, weren't you listening? My uncle was alone, this was the first keepers on the island. I don't even know if its true."

"See that? That's what I'm talking about. Gettin' all frustrated over a simple question. Damn man, have a highball. I'll buy it for you."

“How did your uncle do?” I asked.

“Oh, he was always kind of an asshole so who knows.” Lou said flatly.

There. That's the ending I was after.

Boone laughed his way out to smoke. Lou started dragging trash cans to the back.

For a few moments it's just me and suddenly I want to leave, but I've still got half a beer and 5 or 6 more songs on the juke.

*here are the lyrics, if you want to sing along.