I was out in the shed last night, cleaning the place up and putting things away for winter (the sheds not heated…yet), when my nephew called.
His first question: “Whatcha up to?”
Me: “I’m just hanging out in the shed…..”
Nephew: “Why? It’s friggin’ cold out there!”
And his question got me thinking; Why indeed?
And this got me curious about something else, but bear with me for a bit.
When my father built his garage, many years before I came along, he put-in a service pit in one of the stalls/bays. They’re illegal as hell now where they live, but as a kid I thought nothing of crawling down there to “help him” work on the car, truck, tractor…whatever. I can remember helping him bleed brakes when I was as young as 5 or so. (“Pump it up. Hold it! Let me know when it’s down.”)
When I was about 7 or 8 years old my dad had me tear apart an old Tecumseh lawnmower engine, just to see how it worked. Then he told me to put it back together again, and even though I didn’t have new gaskets, and he had to help me with tightening some things down, the damn thing ran! Sorta….
When I was about 12 or 13 I figured out how to swap the idler pulley in dad's riding lawnmower to make that sucker fly! (I could tell he wanted to be mad, but the smirk on his face gave lie to his anger.)
I bought my first car when I was 14 for $60 (a friend’s car died out in the pasture at our place), and using my own Craftsman tool set, I tore it down into a thousand pieces in the space next to the garage, just because.
One of my first “real” jobs was busting tires and doing oil changes and shocks at Target. After bouncing around at a few shops I eventually found myself working for NAPA, and while I managed two stores before I left, there’s damn little pay in the auto parts industry, so I went back to school to learn HVAC.
But here’s the kicker: Every time I go into a tire store, the back of an auto parts store, or a full service auto repair shop, I feel like I’m “home”. Much like Linus in the old Peanuts strip, it’s almost like a security blanket wraps around me when I go into these places. The smells (tires, oil, antifreeze), the sights (belts hanging on the wall, old parts bins and tools cabinets, the Snap-On calendars), the sounds (air compressors, overhead garage doors), just the overall atmosphere….It’s hard to describe to people who don’t “get it”, but I grew-up in those places, and I feel comfortable and at-ease in that type of environment.
I started to think this may be a “universal” thing amongst Car Guys, but when I talked to my wife about it, she reminded me of two of my friends who are (so called) “Car Guys” (note the quote marks). They’re “Car Guys” only to the extent that that they have nice rides (really nice rides, in fact!), but they don’t get their hands dirty or even change their own oil. (In fact, I doubt that they can.)
So I have a question for y’all: Are there any FABO members here who are “late bloomers” to this whole “car thing”, and if so, do you “get” what I was talking about above? I’m going to assume the guys who grew-up like me feel the same as I in their respective shops, but for the new guys: Does the garage feel comfortable to you, almost like an extension of home? (Please note I’m not taking about Man Caves, as those are a whole ‘nuther thing, in my opinion.) When you walk into a tire store do you take a deep breath-in just to get a whiff of the tires?
And if no one fesses-up to being a late bloomer, I guess I'm curious to know if my assumption holds ("...I’m going to assume the guys who grew-up like me feel the same as I in their respective shops").
Anywhoooo, next time my nephew asks me, “Why?”, I guess I’ll have an answer for him.
Thanks, everyone.
Jim
