In the Fik of it

After so many months of working on the restoration of Dad’s Jeep it was finally ready for a test run.   I’d managed to take the rusting hulks of two, 1946 classics and pull them into one beautiful ride and I wanted to make sure it was running well before I delivered it into his care.   Hearing the nearly 70-year-old engine roar to life after she’d sat silent for the better part of 30 years was magical, silent for nearly a generation I was hearing sound that few still living had ever heard. Anxious to give it a test run in the fields behind the house, I hoisted Bethany up into the passenger seat.    I knew there was no way that she’d ever be able to see enough to navigate over the intricate steps and side cowl of the vehicle so I did a lift-and-toss maneuver like you’d do trying to get an old dog into the back of a truck. At 140 pounds my “hoist” was more of a flailing as legs, feet and arms went in six different directions.   I finally managed to get her butt over the side cowl a

The rubber gasket on the thermos squeals as I tighten the stopper, its echo rattles around the nearly empty office adding to my desolation.  It’s an old office building and I’m constantly reminded of the Edward Hopper painting: “The Office at Night” and the lonely squeal only eggs on my current state of mind.  The painting features enigmatic faces and poses in an overly-lit, late night office from the 1930’s and only provides enough content to give you an emotion, not an opinion. Perhaps the trigger was last night’s wild night with Bethany.  Perhaps it was the past 4 days with her; 4 days, 4 hours, 4 weeks – they all carry the same exhaustive power that Hopper’s painting does.  While the painting is beautiful, it’s anything but restorative.  Listening to my wife upstairs begging with her, half-scream, half-crying in the middle of the night to “go to sleep” - sucks everything from your life in the same way the Hopper’s color and shape choice draws energy away fr

I could still feel in the back of my head, the smell of 70-year-old grease and oil.   Even though the garage door was closed and I was good ways off the pungent odor had a way of finding me, magically warming and repulsing me at the same time.  I’d spent the better part of 2 months with my hands stuck deep in the dark muck of a 1946 Willys Jeep, the rebirthing of which was to be a gift for my father upon his retirement.  It seemed a fitting gift, dad was born in ’41 and this was born in ’46.  He drove one on his first job (that I was old enough to recall), now he can drive one on his last job – the one that I’ll never forget.  Transmission, transfer case, steering knuckles and axles all were field dressed; disemboweled, reviewed, fiddled with, cleaned and reassembled with amazement and reverence.  She’d been a “field find” which means that my heart ran way ahead of my brain, seeing in that fallow field a vehicle that offered only a vision of finished beauty a

She woke up happy this morning, I should have known I’d have wet sheets; why else would she be up so early?  As she stood there dancing around, chirping like an early morning bird, I gathered wet bedding happy for the joy in her voice.  The more I dug at the sheets, the more I realized the severity of the watering.  As she turned around I saw the dark outline reaching up to her middle back; “crap” I muttered out loud.  I knew the battle I was in for – a wet sweatshirt, vest, camisole and jeans meant this morning would turn into an epic battle. I struggled to get her to surrender the ever-present denim vest and hooded sweatshirt, peeling them off with her fighting with every ounce of resistance she could offer.  Pulling that sweatshirt off in her mind is like flaying skin and sometimes I wonder if it hasn’t been on so long that it’s actually attached to her. I managed to get them all off and summarily marched her to the shower.  Once in, I have 120 seconds in