Okay, to be sure we are amazing to differing degrees-- there are some ten-thumbed newbies and guys whose Mice look like they were built by the man who built a crooked house and walked a crooked mile, but at the other end there are those whose work defines the Platonic Ideal of what it means to be a Boat.
But more than that-- we are by and large an extraordinarily capable group, men and women whose wives and husbands will call to us and say, "Hon, the (insert object, such as "bed", "chair", "water heater", "roof" and so on) is broken," meaning, not just that it is broken but that we should fix it. We are the fixers, the problem solvers, the solution makers.
Oh sure, now and then we make problems, "Hon! We have too many %$*^! boats!" our spouses cry out, but mostly we are the fixers. The ones with the tools, the glue, the duct tape. We change wheels, tires, transmissions; we fix outboards, inboards, broken masts, hulls with holes; we build paddle boats, row boats, sail boats, ice boats. We're the ones on the roof fixing the flashing, in the basement installing the sump pump, in the kitchen under the sink fixing the disposal, stopping the leak, cleaning the %&#! trap. We're the ones at Home Despot or Lowes at 9:50 at night getting the wire nuts, the flaring tool, the solder, the pvc, the mending plates, the glue, the bits, the paint, the plaster, the varnish.
"Wasn't the ceiling light over there before?"
And when the parents of our kids' friends come to pick them up they say "Wasn't the ceiling light over there before?" or "I see there's a new boat in the driveway!" or "Where is the stairway to the second floor?" and look sort of baffled when we say "Oh yes, I broke the kitchen light fixture so I moved the light fixture from the dining room to the playroom and put the playroom ceiling fixture in the kitchen, then bought a new fixture to install in the dining room, but I had to do that anyway because I wanted to replace the ceiling," or "Yeah, I wanted a boat the boys could take sailing in the lake that wasn't too hard to sail but that wasn't too wet so I built that one over the last couple of months," or "Oh, that, we decided to change the access to the basement, so we had to take out the back stairway and I'm reversing the direction of the front stairway. I have the stringers made and I'm picking up the treads later this week." as though these are all endeavors beyond the reach of mere... people.
"Oh yes, I broke the kitchen light fixture so I moved the light fixture from
the dining room to the playroom and put the playroom ceiling fixture
in the kitchen, then bought a new fixture to install in the dining room,
but I had to do that anyway because I wanted to replace the ceiling,"
Some of us might not feel so amazing as all that, chagrined at the way the last project came out, unsatisfied with the finish or the performance or the style, but first to last, oldest to youngest, most capable to least, we are all of one tribe, all cut from the same cloth, all sisters and brothers before the mast (as it were).
So hat's off to us, one and all, and here's to a boatload of successful projects to come -- straight cuts, no thumbs left behind, boats that float, sail where we mean for them to go, rowed hard, paddled gently leaving miles of smiles in their wakes....
Mike Connelly |
