Thursday, September 29, 2016

Broken Down Tractors




My dad loved to tinker. He bought vintage Mustangs and brought them back to life, rebuilt numerous cars and trucks, and fixed just about every mechanical thing in our house at one time or another. He lived by the "If it moves, grease it; If it doesn't move, paint it," adage.

A Greatest Generation MacGyver, Dad really could fix just about anything with a hammer and electrician's tape. I almost wrote that he could fix practically everything with a screwdrive and tape, but Dad wasn't that subtle. A hammer was more his style. In fact, I still have an indelible image of him pounding a screw into some project using a hammer, and then commenting that the threads on a screw were put there for removal purposes only. Dad generally took the most expedicious route to solve any problem or fix any broken down thing. He never wasted effort on things like actually screwing in the screw.

Dad only owned one new car in his life because he saw no reason to shoulder the financial loss of the initial depreciation, when he could make used cars work almost like new. And if that was true for cars, it was even more so for lawn tractors. Not only did he NOT EVER buy a new lawn tractor, he loudly ridiculed anyone (including my husband) who did so.

Buying old tractors and fixing them up was one of Dad's primary post-retirement hobbies. And if the old thing broke down or threw a belt every time he tried to mow with it, so much the better - because the breakdown gave him another reason to tinker - another reason make a run to the junk yard or hardware store. (He actually bought mowing deck and tractor belts by the gross!)



The most notorious of his tractor creations was the one he cobbled together from two, or maybe three, junk-yard finds. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find a photograph of that "monster" tractor, but it ended up looking similar to the one pictured above. Since the engine was from one tractor and the transmission was from another, they weren't exactly compatible, so Dad ended up having to put two gear boxes in the thing to make it run slowly enough to mow. The down side was that the improvised rigging made the tractor a bit too long for the job it was intended to do. It's wide turning radius forced Dad to mow both our yard and the neighbor's if he wanted to get the darn thing turned around and headed back in the opposite direction.

Despite the fact that the monster tractor wasn't particularly well suited for yard mowing, it did make a great vehicle for getting around the neighborhood. When our sons were little, Dad loved to pull them up in his lap for a ride down the street and around the block. The thing made so much noise that all the neighbors were sure to look out to see what was up, which gave Dad a great opportunity to show off his grandsons.

Remember that I told you that Dad made fun of my husband for spending the money to buy a new tractor? Well, here's the rest of that story. After Dad died, my husband took on the responsibility of mowing the yard for my mom, using his new Cub Cadet tractor. The first three times he went down to the house to mow, something on that new tractor broke - a belt snapped, or a mowing deck wheel came off, etc. The first two times it happened, my husband figured it was just a coincidence, normal wear and tear. But when it occurred again on the third attempt to mow, he decided had to be more than that. His thoughts were confirmed when he heard my dad's laughter ringing in his ears.




Monday, September 12, 2016

Dinky and the Duck



I introduced you to my Aunt Vi, AKA "Dinky," in an earlier post - the sore-toed sister and accomplice of the pie-pan, chicken murdering sister. In today's episode, Dinky is getting ready to receive a suitor, a beau, or as my grandmother would have said, "a feller she's sweet on."

If you remember, I also mentioned that my mother's nuclear family included my grandfather and grandmother, nine siblings, and an old bachelor uncle. Uncle George was, for lack of a better description, a character. Well, "a character" is actually an understatement, but it's the best I can do at the moment. Let's just say that Uncle George was a tease, and a prankster, and a bit of a scamp.

Dinky also had four older siblings, three of whom were already married at the time of the duck incident. Kind, hardworking, devoted, Mae, the eldest, married Renford Murphy, an exceedingly sweet-tempered man, after the war and moved to Greenville Alabama with him. (That's a story for another day.) James, the serious oldest son, was married to Lucille, a perky, petite woman, with the tiniest feet I think I ever saw on a grown woman. And then there was my mom, Vaughnie (or Bonnie as she was known by most, because she hated her given name) who was married to Glenn, my notorious, bug-squashing father, whom you met in the "Stiff-neck Chronicles."

Now, just imagine what sort of devious mischief might happen on a lazy, boring Sunday afternoon, when you put that prankster uncle together with my jokester father (especially if you add a snort or two into the mix.) And then imagine that you are Vi - all dressed up in your Sunday-go-to-meetin' finest, ready and anxious to receive your gentleman caller - the perfect, unsuspecting target. Got an image?

So what do you think, happened next? Well, it wasn't fun for Dinky, I can tell you that much for sure.

The expected date arrived, nervously shaking hands all around, and was shuffled into a proffered place on the front porch swing to await his girl. Moments later, Vi came out of the house, smiling brightly at her gentleman caller, her dress perfection and curls bouncing in that flirtatious way curls used to bounce in the 40's. She practically danced across the worn floor boards and took her seat beside her young man on the swing.

Now the treachery begins. With a mischievous grin, Uncle George scooped up one of the baby ducklings that were running around in the yard and handed it to my dad, his partner in crime, gesturing for him to give it to Vi. Which he did of course, with no hesitation, placing the baby duck squarely in the middle of Vi's lap, on the full skirt of her best dress.

I'm sure you can guess what happened next. The duckling did as ducklings do when dropped against their will into the lap of a loudly protesting teenaged girl. It squawked and flapped away, leaving a long streak of duck poo in its wake. Dinky, seeing that her beautiful dress was ruined, and mortified beyond belief, bolted for the house, chased by guffaws of laughter from Uncle George, Brother-in-law Glenn, and all of the other family members who were witness to her embarrassment. Witnesses, I might add who did nothing to forestall her humiliation, even when they knew what was coming.

As if this incident in itself wasn't bad enough, it has been remembered and recounted time and time again by Vi's siblings and in-laws - to her continued dismay. Quite often throughout the years, when it was felt that a reminder was called for, a little yellow duck of some sort would show up at the appropriate time, and the moment would be relived in all it's hilarity. This included a birthday, not too many years ago, when a cake sported a yellow ducky and read, "Happy Birthday, Dinky!"





Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Guarding Your Tongue - Is "Honesty" the Best Policy?



What has happened to the sage advice, "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all?" I grew up hearing that expression, meant to spare feelings and maintain relationships, didn't you? My mother was particularly adamant about it. Well, these days it seems like that wise admonition has been completely disregarded in favor of speaking your mind, no matter who is hurt or what relationships are ruined.

Today we're living in a world that is almost completely lacking in social graces. Manners have gone the way of quiet gentility - thrown out the proverbial window. And in favor of what? Brutal honesty? Which is, to my mind, simply an excuse for expressing any mean-spirited opinion one possesses, with no need to filter or moderate the hatefulness being spouted.

Over and over again, I'm hearing and reading statements such as - "I'm just being brutally honest. If that hurts your feelings, here's a Band-Aid." So, now it's not only okay to attack viciously and without conscience, but to blame the victim for being "too sensitive" if the attack causes them harm? I don't think so. In fact, I agree with Richard Needham who said, "People who are brutally honest get more satisfaction out of the brutality than the honesty."

Frankly, I do not understand the appeal that proclaimed "honesty" has these days. Not only because that honesty tends to be simple brutality specifically aimed at particular targets, but also because that proclaimed "honesty" is actually personal opinion spun to resemble truth, and not truth at all. Just because a person says what he or she thinks and makes a claim of "being honesty" does not guarantee that there is any truth whatsoever in their statements, though many people assume that honesty and truth are synonymous.

Webster defines honesty as frank directness, and bluntness, in addition to integrity, morality, righteousness, goodness, truthfulness, and reliability. I say that there is much, much more of the first two definitions in most statements of honesty than any of the latter. Honesty these days is simply not what I grew up knowing honesty to be. Now its a tool to sway, or browbeat, others to your way of thinking and to belittle those who don't agree with your premise.

So, in this, I long for "The Good Old Days," when people valued thoughtfulness, kindness, and circumspectness in speech, and when they spoke to build bridges between people and not to tear them down. And I wonder just how far this brutal trend will go and how much damage it will ultimately do. It worries me.

Not to preach, but...we are warned, repeatedly, and not only by adages spouted by our elders, but by the Big Guy upstairs, to guard our tongues -

Proverbs 15:1- "A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger."

James 3: 5, 6 - " Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one's life on fire, and is itself on fire by hell." and

Ephesians 4: 29 - " Do not let unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen."

So I say, in this, do as your mother told you.