John Steinbeck is my current favorite author. You remember reading Of Mice and Men and the Grapes of Wrath or the Cliff Notes of those works. Maybe you saw the movie version of Cannery Row--Nick Nolte and was it Debra Winger?? In June a friend suggested Travels With Charley. Fun book. Next I picked up America and Americans. Steinbeck observed that a book becomes a good friend to the reader. I relate to that. We say "I like this book. This is a good book. I can't put this book down." Same as our friends--we like them. They're good--we wouldn't put them down.
Reading has become my hobby more than any other activity. Books are my friends. So is the author--although they don't know it. Some do. With the internet you can find just about any living author. I once tracked down--not stalked, and wrote to Jacqueline Mitchard, although not to compliment her. I didn't like what she wrote in her syndicated column--so I told her. She wrote back. We are not friends and I am even more adamant Ms. Mitchard--- JFK Jr is not to be admired for flying blindly into the night and killing two innocent people along with himself. I don't care how nice he was on Martha's Vinyard--playing reckless with the lives of people who trust you is criminal. Don't get me started again. That was years ago. I should put that load down finally. I wrote complimentary things to other authors and got nice replies. We all felt better for being nice.
Cathy's gardens are her friends. She has an arboretum of gardens. Amazing what she can make grow in the shaded yard with hard soil. Cathy can make the ground say flowers. Doc makes the ground say muck and he eats some of her plants. Just a little kid at heart, Doc likes to lounge in the dirt and walk through the plants. Cathy loves her gardens and they respond with affection. The poison ivy doesn't love Cathy... It's her Jacqueline Mitchard.
Patrick is a Honda Civic gear head. I mean that in the most endearing way. Cars are his friends. His friends are friends of cars. Patrick and his friends more than tinker with cars. It's good to see my son doing something useful with his hands. I played with basketballs and footballs. Lot of good that does me today. My Dad, PT's Grandpa would be proud. He'd finally have the boy in the family who shares his enjoyment of motors. And Hondas too!
Last week I started in on something over my head: converting a 1978 Evinrude outboard motor from a long shaft to a short shaft. I knew nothing about this process when I started. The internet proved it's worth. I found a great diagram and step by step instructions for just what I wanted to do. A few emails to a mechanic from my Dad's long departed Sport Marine, and I had the expert advice I needed--as long as I read all of the directions and listened to what I was told. When I was a little guy I spent my time in the Sport Marine polishing the Hondas and Evinrudes, not tinkering with them. Should have been tinkering.
The more I worked on this motor, the more it became my friend. The more I tinkered, the more I found myself reading the directions. Eventually the tinkering and directions merged into understanding. Patrick stepped in last night to give me the hand I needed. We almost got the motor together and working last night. I needed one more night of pondering. Fascinating what can be accomplished pondering in the night. Apparently all day clutter is put to rest and the subject at hand gets full brain power.
Tonight we picked up where we left off and click click, snap and everything slid into place. The drive shaft slid into place and engaged. The shifter moved down to forward, back to neutral and back to reverse. When we connected the gas line, water muffs, and started the engine water went in where it was supposed to and emerged where it should. I'm a gear head.
I like that motor. It's a good motor. It's my friend...because Patrick and I made it go together.
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