I often drive by several homes I’ve lived in, but I pass a particular small ranch on a postage-stamp in-town lot more regularly now. It’s on one of my routes to my newest place, hopefully my last one.
I lived in that old house for a very short time. But my time there is magnified in my mind the most, because it was the house my Father saved up for, the only one he could afford, while we lived in spare rooms at my sister’s house after our old two-story burned to the ground on a cold February night.
It was a gut punch for my Old Man, my Mama too. More so my Mama, honestly. She lost our baby pictures, and it still pains her to this day.
In truth, I still look for things I think I once had, now long gone and buried in ash. And I was only 18 then.
A baseball glove to play catch with my son had to be repurchased after the gap in life when you otherwise have no need for one. It’s strange
The rifle my Grandfather gave me when I turned 18, never fired by me, even once; that’s gone.
I wish I could get that Marlin back; it was one of the good ones, a 30-30, built in a time when older men in the New Haven factory would finish polishing a sear and trigger, pairing them perfectly like a sommelier pairs good wine and beef, before punching out for lunch, fearing it might not pass muster with the inspector, but more that they loved their job.
I digress.
We- meaning my Mother, Father, and younger Sister lived in that little house for a very short time. My older two sisters were married and living elsewhere; my youngest was still in high school, and I was stuck between being a boy and a man, believing I was the latter but staying in my parents’ basement while I got my sea legs.
I watched my first round of MTV on a black-and-white television in the living room there. Yes, color television was well entrenched in society by 1983. But that was the television that someone had given us after the fire. It worked well, and my parents were thankful.
My parents are why I am thankful so often. Mom and Dad embraced thankfulness, and the fire only deepened it.
Since moving to the Ranch on the Knoll, I drive by the old, now newly sided, matchbox of a dwelling at least three times a week. When I do, I can see twenty-year-old me, on the ground in the crumbling asphalt driveway replacing the front brakes of my extremely rusty 1976 Pontiac.
It’s not the brakes I am thinking of, although I can clearly picture the dinged, dented blue tin box of K-Mart-branded ratchet and sockets, SAE for those who forgot automobiles used to be simple to work on. I swear, I look for the dirty sockets spread out in dirt when I pass, as if it’s still 1983, and I am someone else.
I guess I am, but not really; I am exactly the same.
What I recall the most is a brief conversation with my Father, stopping in for lunch, while I blocked most of the driveway with my project. I can smell his Aqua Velva, as he’d just showered after mid-day basketball in men’s league at the brick YMCA over on Court Street in Bangor.
He was in an Impala, maroon at that time.
My Father, if given a choice, was always in an Impala. I wish I was, frankly. He later tried an Oldsmobile for a while, right after front-wheel drive became the best thing ever. He hated that car. I finally steered him into Toyota Camrys, and he never looked back.
My car was parked on the slight incline, as unsafe as can be, with wood blocks stuffed under the rear wheels to hold it there. I was sitting cross-legged, trying to reuse a cotter pin on the wheel hub. I’d finally found that pin after losing it twice in the gravel.
I heard the Impala pull in, and my father rolled down the passenger window to ask how the job was going.
“How’s it going, Chief?” He called me Chief more often than he called me Tim.
“Good,” I said, trying to push the re-straightened pin through the greasy gap in the crown nut.
“Make sure they work before you go traipsing around in that heap,” he said, laughing. “I’m impressed you can do that; I never could.”
My Father was not mechanical, but he could shoot a basketball, hit a baseball, softball, any ball, as no one else’s father could.
“If you need to have it checked by a mechanic, I can loan you a couple of bucks to take it over to Stan on State Street.”
“No, I think it’s good. I still have the back brakes if these don’t take,” I said.
Stan was a mechanic my father trusted, often retelling the story of the day Stan’s blue Dickie pants were more than halfway down to his thighs as he bent over while changing my Father’s oil.
My Dad enjoyed laughing, sometimes to a fault, losing his breath and ability to talk for thirty seconds at a time. That day, my father pointed out to Stan that his pants were coming down, and I still remember my Father’s rendition of the event, mimicking Stan’s thick Downeast accent,
“They ain’t gonna fall down no furthah, they stay right they-ah!”
My Old Man could barely get through the sentence before breaking out in guffaws. He loved simple laughs. So do I.
“Well, I’m proud of you, Chief. I’m glad you are figuring it out.” Referring to the brake job, yes, but there was deeper meaning to that short sentence.
We’d been through a lot, him more than me, of course. I think of my Father, looking back, and now, while driving by, was most happy that he’d raised a resilient son who didn’t need to pay Stan and would soon be off on his own without much need for further support.
With that, he put the Impala in drive and moved further into the driveway to grab a sandwich that I am sure was tuna, but with lettuce, that Mama was putting together when she heard our exchange from the open kitchen window.
I write this today because I’ve been driving by that house for two years, each time hearing my Old Man’s voice. If I didn’t write it down, well, I’d kick myself.
I think writing it down and putting it out there will help me drive by that house and smile more instead of looking into the driveway for a cotter pin or sockets that I might have left behind.
Today, I celebrate resilience; it’s underappreciated, and I had a good teacher.
Keep your hands to yourself, leave other people’s things alone, and be kind to one another.
From the Jagged Edge of America, I remain,
TC
AKA-“Chief”
Thanks for supporting the writing, FB posts, and books. Thank you to my BUYMEACOFFEE members; you make it possible for me to write instead of doing bad brake jobs in the driveway. TC