To my mind, there's a vast difference between people who know how to fix stuff and those who don't. A Grand Canyon-sized chasm, brimming with very capable guys toting red toolboxes.
Recently, my wife and I drove our daughter's car from Vancouver to Victoria. She doesn't need it right now, so we brought it home. Anyway, somewhere along the Pat Bay Highway, the car started to make a funny noise.
Sort of a rattle. Metallic and disturbing. I went on high alert, as such noises usually mean expensive repairs. The weird thing was, the sound wasn't constant. So I experimented a little. If you accelerated, it would happen. If you kept a steady pace - no noise.
So, maybe something wrong with ... the accelerator? The engine? I started getting mad at the Japanese-car specialist who'd just tuned it up. What were we paying for, for God's sake? I did the fast/slow acceleration thing half a dozen more times. Then a guy from behind zoomed up beside us, looked over and started tapping his head vigorously.
"Don't do that," said my wife. "Just drive in a normal manner."
"OK," I said.
Obviously, she lacked my scientific approach when it came to assessing mechanical malfunction. Think. Think. The CD player? I flicked my fingernail on the faceplate to see if it was, I dunno, loose or something. No improvement. The noise continued.
Then I noticed the cigarette lighter. It was rolling around in a plastic tray. My daughter had put it there, because the cord to her GPS navigator plugs into the lighter hole. It was causing the metallic noise.
"The lighter!" I declared, no doubt replicating Einstein's triumphant tone when he discovered E=mc2.
"Yes, I know," my wife said. "It's been rolling around in that plastic tray."
This made me feel rather foolish. I felt as bright as Alaska in December, or Christy Clark after she said that thing about Victoria.
It reminded me of that time we phoned an electrician to fix a faulty outdoor socket. The Christmas tree lights in our laurel bush - the lights that remind people year-round that Yuletide fast approaches - would no longer light up.
The electrician took a look. He said there was a breaker button on the outdoor socket. One only had to press to reset it. He pressed the button. And like magic, the Christmas tree lights illuminated. I felt like an idiot, especially while handing over a thick wad of cash for the service call.
And I just knew, within hours, the electrician would be regaling his electrician buddies with this tale.
"It was like taking a thick wad of cash from a baby," he'd say.
"You mean, a very dumb baby," his friends would reply.
"I mean the kind of baby who not only cannot fix things, but doesn't even try," the first electrician would say.
And then they'd buy another round of refreshing beers with my wad of cash.
I was telling my mother about this the other day.
Well, not about this, specifically. But I was telling her about a friend of mine who - being very bright and mechanically minded - had expertly fixed the plughole on our bathtub.
"Never mind," said my mum. "You're good at other things."
"Like what?" I said.
She thought for a minute or two.
"Well, you were quite good at playing the alto saxophone in the high school concert band," she finally said.
The problem is, for us non-fixers, there's a big disconnect at work. We think we can't fix stuff, therefore, we don't even try. In this manner, we save valuable time. It's sort of like how we (the non-fixers) gave up on math as soon as they started teaching algebra.
My new resolution is to start trying to fix things, just like real men do. Right now, I have a red toolbox that contains a hammer and a pair of pliers. My plan: (1) take it to the hardware store and (2) fill it with useful tools.
I'll let you know how that one goes.
