Mondaugen's Miscellany

The Future of Beauty

(Though distracted by Hand Craftsmanship in the Digital Age and my Handmade Purpose book project, purposeful whining about contemporary architecture and design is still close to my heart... so...)

Beauty is not appreciated through reason—it is enjoyed through feelings. There is no objective beauty; it goes directly to the heart—a glowing rainbow over a field of ripe wheat needs no explanation. The program of the modern movement made it impossible to express feelings. Following its principles, the designs of the last century have lost emotional appeal.

-Eva ZeiseL, 2004

Man’s capacity for aesthetic enjoyment may have been his most practical characteristic, for nearly all the industrially useful properties of matter and ways of shaping materials had their origins in the playful search for beauty. Beauty is at the root of man’s discovery of the world around him, and makes him want to live.

-Cyril Smith (of MIT), via Zeisel

I can feel the way the conversation begins. The young architect/designer, awed by the heights of glass and steel design in the 20th century, and having studied the aesthetics to the point of being conversant in their language and logic, will be eager to offer counterarguments to Smith and Zeisel. The older architect/designer, however, having heard such accusations before, will likely smile in the knowledge that they are paper arrows. If Tom Wolfe's critique could be dismissed out of hand, and with no more than a ripple in the industry, then Zeisel can be tolerated, a gadfly. An acknowledging nod to Smith is also enough to move on... for, in the end, the smaller, nostalgic minds that cling to the naive concept of beauty and don't "get" modernism are not worth engaging. Perhaps, in a good mood we might get a patronizing acceptance that yes, people do like beauty, and there are some unsuccessful modernist buildings, but no more.

Leaving us where...?

...in a world of built environments that are far uglier than we realize, as we have been sold on playful, intellectual, clever artistry in steel, glass and concrete. While some of our sharper minds may be stimulated by the triumphs of modernism, our bodies(with their confusing, even feminine, emotions, their disgusting needs, their low appeal), have been left behind. And with our bodies goes beauty, a concept that strongly resists being intellectualized.

--

A case in point is the James R. Thompson Center in downtown Chicago. Built in 1985, it was never well-adapted to hosting human beings (unless you enjoy 90 degree interior temps in summer and interior ice on your windows in winter). The original bright red and blue panels faded from UV long ago. Rust and corrosion appear everywhere. The exterior is always filthy with uncleaned (uncleanable?) walls and windows. To me, the building says Dystopian Japanese Cityscape from Akira. As a work of art, I think it is fascinating. But not a place I want to live or work. One visit of an hour or two is enough for a lifetime.

I wonder what kind of mind I'd have after years of working in the Thompson Center? A mind of metal and wheels?

--

What happens if we respect Zeisel's assessment, and explore it? Asking our built environments to have an emotional appeal and place beauty among important values does not end with shag carpeting everywhere. Instead I think we would end with the pursuit that Smith describes -- the pursuit of the utility found in beauty.

This is an idea worth considering beyond merely acknowledgement. If beauty drives understanding, and understanding drives invention and creation, then we lose everything that makes us human when we decide beauty is not worth pursuing. We will no longer have a reason to engage and understand the material world. We will be left with the despair of purposelessness (which frankly, is what spaces such as the Thompson Center leave me feeling as neither my flesh-and-blood body, nor my squishy feelings have a place or role in a world of mathematical interactions of glass, metal, and steel).

If we've decided that the rates of depression and anxiety in in the developed world are an issue, then maybe we can build our ways out of them by acknowledging beauty as a worthwhile goal.

--

I wonder how Smith and Zeisel came to their understanding of the importance of beauty. Experience? or Argument? In The Descent of Man, Darwin argues for a second evolutionary pressure, that of beauty, as natural selection in itself had trouble explaining the peacock's tail. The idea is that it's the peahen's aesthetic preference for, and pleasure in, male mates with more and more beautiful displays that drives the creation of the tail display. Aesthetic pleasure is thus universal among animals that choose mates, and the driving force for natural beauty across the animal world. Of course, this concept of beauty is relative-- only a male star-nosed mole would find a female star-nosed mole beautiful.... but perhaps there is some fundamental and universal concept of beauty and pleasure that can be found in all animals, and maybe plants too. (I came across the idea in Richard Prum's book The Evolution of Beauty, and have not read all of Darwin to see how far into living things he extends the pursuit of aesthetic pleasure--do algae share a primitive version of this drive?).  

If beauty is an evolutionary and biological force driving us to pursue aesthetic pleasure in our mates, how does this drive translate to everything else? Would we want/need/crave beauty in everything else? Does the peahen want an equally beautiful house to live in with her beautiful man? I wonder if any given woman's concept of beauty in a man drives her concept of general beauty. Do heterosexual men and women have, by definition, a different concept of beauty? Or is the nature of beauty more fundamental than the specifics of curving hips or strong shoulders?

Smith's idea of the utility of beauty is simple--that it makes us want to get out of bed and find it (or make it), because it makes us feel good. Thus, beauty gives us purpose in life. This feels as elegant and simple an answer to the meaning of life as E=MC2 is to mathematics and physics.

--

But then... if beauty is in our evolutionary heritage, and woven into our instincts, how is it that modern designers convinced to live and work in manifestly threatening, intellectually challenging, clean, plain and angular design? One can say many things about the Thompson Center, but "it's beautiful" is not one of them, except perhaps in the way Apocalypse Now's Colonel Kilgore says he loves the smell of napalm in the morning.

Why do any of us like the smell of napalm? I think the answer lies, in part, in another part of our biological evolution--Dawkin's selfish gene. If given a choice, we prefer more over better. Thus it is better to have as many children as possible than raise fewer to be more successful (why we have 7+ billion on the planet now), even though the quality of life for us, and for our children, will likely be lower than if we had chosen fewer. As they say, No Pain, No Gain, and the Gain is in having More of Less.

The other reason lies in our cultural evolution. Ugly, intellectual architecture is a step child of industrialization. As we painted factory smoke across out skies, so we built bridges from bare iron beams. Making metal and wheels in turn shaped our minds to metal and wheels.

The First and Second World Wars added fuel to this fire. We simply don't deserve beauty any more because there can be no laughter after Auschwitz. Beauty became naive in light of the evil that progressive minds thought we had grown out of.

--

An approach to architecture that includes beauty as a primary value would have to shake off the social mind of metal and wheels that we grew through centuries of industrialization. We would need to embrace who we are as humans to once again include it in our built environments. The complexities and contradictions in how we understand ourselves culturally, socially, and individually would have to be unwound and reassembled. The peacock does not wear jeans and a t-shirt to cover his naturally-evolved beauty, but we humans do. We make our clothes to be beautiful, as well as functional. Why not our houses too? The future of beauty could include every aspect of our lives.

 

 

How to Tell a Stranger about Iowa

Last week I visited family farms in Iowa. It was my third trip. I came away with a feeling that I understood them in ways I had not before. I felt them.

Twenty years ago, at my great uncle Tom's funeral, my cousin Sophie read a poem:

Landscape--Iowa

No one who lives here
knows how to tell the stranger
what it’s like, the land I mean,
farms all gently rolling,
squared off by roads and fences,
creased by streams, stubbled with groves,
a land not known by mountain’s height
or tides of either ocean,
a land in its working clothes,
sweaty with dew, thick-skinned loam,
a match for the men who work it,
breathes dust and pollen, wears furrows
and meadows, endures drought and flood.
Muscles swell and bulge in horizons
of corn, lakes of purple alfalfa,
a land drunk on spring promises,
half-crazed with growth—I can no more
tell the secrets of its dark depths
than I can count the banners in a
farmer’s eye at spring planting.

                        --James Hearst

At the time, I appreciated Hearst's words as a stranger. I had never been to Iowa, though born and raised in Milwaukee. Instead, I had learned to scoff at the Midwest as flyover country, that farming was dull, not intellectual, and not worthy of consideration. I had learned a prejudice. Tom had spent much of his life managing my extended family's farmland in Iowa. Family politics offered a way to become involved, but at a price that I was not willing to pay. I could not say we were close--we were both woodworkers and yet did not visit each other's shops, nor did we talk much of Iowa and farming--but I had genuine affection for him that I believed he shared for me. I sat at his funeral, a close relation and deeply sad at his passing, but a stranger to his lifetime endeavor. Such are families.

The first time I visited Iowa, a few years after Tom passed, I was overwhelmed by all that Hearst's poem touches on. A rolling ocean of golden corn and soybeans. A grid of fields imposed over ancient glacial terrain. Machinery that dwarfed houses and was guided by satellite. Earth as black as night. Roads laid out precisely East-West and North-South, except where surveyors made mistakes and so added a curving jog. A giant sky above, the moving clouds writing out tales. It was not an idealized tropical island paradise, or soaring majestic purple mountains, or ancient dark forest. The farms I visited were not near any national parks attracting millions of visitors. But the beauty of Iowa was easy to find.

---

The second time I visited, I strove to learn. Arriving with different eyes, I saw different things.

Perhaps the greatest gift of working with wood is enforced humility. Boards do not become a table through the imposition of ego and will, but through respect for, understanding of, and negotiation with the material. I started by admitting that I knew nothing of farming. I read crop reports, market reports, watched grain markets, studied bin maintenance, tried to map out supply chains, learn the role of farm managers, understand corn and soybean agronomy. I watched the Millennial Farmer's Youtube channel to learn about the daily life of a Minnesotan farmer (and "Clarkson's Farm" for how not to farm). I learned how much there is to know, and how little I understood. I learned about good stewardship of the land and its many interpretations. I found appreciation and gratitude for the work of the managers and operators, all they know and do, and something of why they do it. I learned what my great uncle and cousins had achieved, through their smart decisions, honest management, kindness, and commitment, helping our family farms thrive. I felt awe before the whole endeavor.

---

This third trip left me quiet and thoughtful.

While riding in a combine harvesting corn late one afternoon, I asked the farmer what he loved about his job. He gestured directly in front of us, the twelve-row head noisily eating at the ocean of dry corn in front of us.

"I love combining. Isn't it beautiful?"

"The results of all your work over the year?" I asked back, hoping for more details.

"Yeah. It's beautiful," he replied, and stayed quiet.

No one who lives here knows how to tell the stranger.

I watched out in front of the combine, did my best to stay quiet, and just experienced what combining was. 

For its not about the words, those inadequate suitcases of thought and feeling. Words might be handy to transfer thoughts, but are no substitute for immediate experience. The poet's job is like embalming life.

I focused on the fields of corn, looked for their beauty. I thought of the beauty of the grain of a freshly finished board, the clear oil revealing what sanding had only hinted at. I felt beauty in the cornfield. It was easy to see when I looked at what was right before me.

---

Farmers know the joys of engaged work with their hands. The fruits of their labor are tangible, bought with hard work, and thoughtful problem solving. Their workplace is beautiful, their materials are naturally beautiful. The results benefit other people. Not every job offers beauty and usefulness so easily. A corporate lawyer told me his work offered neither, and the only thing about he enjoyed was the paycheck. After he detailed what he did, I believed him.

On the drive back home I wondered if we can only learn, appreciate, and understand what we can feel. Is emotional engagement the primary motivation towards knowledge? If you love it, you'll pursue it? If so, then Elon Musk is one big dummy. For as flexible and far-reaching his intellect may be, I sense he does not feel deeply about anything he says or does. Twitter, free speech, Ukrainian communication satellites --all feel like bottle caps he flicks back and forth between his fingers on a table, trying to pass the time waiting for his food to be served. His failure to understand free speech emotionally could be our undoing as a nation, the straw to the camel's back in the virtual public sphere that has lost its core connection to reality and responsibility. And he is one of many, like the corporate lawyer, who do not love their work, just the paycheck.

I hope to be back in Iowa soon, looking at the Spring planting, with banners in my eyes.

Conversations with Priscilla

My trip with Priscilla from Santa Fe to Chicago began with a ceremonial oil change.

To note, for 43 year old Harleys, Priscilla was a lucky girl: she had landed in the hands of Dave Crosby, who not just took care of her, but helped her recover from an abusive childhood. In 1979, she started life as a stock FLH, traded hands a few times before a mason bought her. He drank too much, thought of Harleys as penis extensions, and hotrodded her with a big bore kit, oversize cams, S&S carb, fancy paintjob, etc, but offered her nothing he couldn’t brag about: no stiffer clutch to handle her greater power, no lube for her swingarm, no checks on her spoke tension, no maintenance. He’d ride her hard and put her away wet.

After a few hard drops and other misadventures, the mason traded Priscilla for drinking money. Dave locked eyes with her at a Dealership, and thought she’d make a great gift for his wife Faith. It was only after he got her home that discovered her many “issues”, and realized no part of her wasn’t in need of rebuilding. After major efforts, he got her into enough ruddy health to make her rideable, if not reliable. In this state, and with strict injunctions to beware of her, for multiple reasons, Dave let me buy her.

I fully understood unreliable bikes. My first was a 1991 Jawa 350 named Snake. Snake’s homicidal streak was wide, deep and long. Snake had one saving grace — a lack of power. He had an uncanny delight in seizing his front disc brake, if for a fraction of a second, at high speed. But high speed for Snake was 40-50mph, and getting there took a while, so I was rarely there. Snake threw me once, at about 10 miles an hour, and no harm but scuffed pants and dented pride resulted. In time, we learned mutual respect, and I survived.

Priscilla, on the other hand, is a different beast. A twist of the wrist, and 93 cubic inches of fuel air explosion dislodges snot back into my skull, makes my asshole pucker, and makes my eyeballs flatten, squish and hurt. Jolting forward, she clatters and vibrates so hard that I can’t keep my feet on the footboards. The noise from her straight pipes jangles consciousness. Unlike modern Japanese or German bikes that snap your neck from the acceleration but offer no difference in feel between 20mph and 120mph, Priscilla announces speed with an airhorn and a baseball bat. You notice. That’s the ol’ pepper, boy! At speed, our mortality becomes apparent and immanent. Priscilla also looks the part, more Road Warrior than weekend warrior. Thirty years of oil leaks and road grit remain intact, giving her patched parts a dingy, dark patina. Her tank and front fender are a faded peach color with black pinstriped swirls. Her tank emblem is from a ‘58. She has a plain black rear fender and leather saddle bags. She looks mean, though the peach-colored tank winks playfully. You will think twice about throwing a leg over her.

The day before I set out, Dave and I changed her oil, a final tweak to ensure her smooth running back to Chicago.

I noticed her tail light was out. Thankfully Dave had a spare, and we fixed her in five minutes. I packed a range of probable tools, spare oil, extra nuts and bolts, spare plugs, extra clothes, a rain suit, a tent, a sleeping bag, a ground pad, and three water bottles. I checked the map — hot and dry through the great plains for the next several days. Dave would ride with me for a few hours on the first day, watching and smelling for any major issues. He would be my 24/7 Roadside Assistance Contact for the whole trip, always at the end of the phone.

Dave’s offer of help was most appreciated. Still, it led to ambivalent thoughts. There is a pleasure in being out there alone on the road, with no backup plan, just one’s own wits, knowledge, and experience. I expected Priscilla to throw troubles at me, watch how I responded to her, and prove to her I was a worthy rider. I didn’t want someone else to make problems go away for me. It’s the grown up version of I can do it myself, mom! The greater pleasure, however, is in the sharing of friendship. Dave’s 24/7 Roadside Assistance was not a burden on him, but a joy to be a part of Priscilla’s and my adventure. Frankly, problemsolving is so enjoyable, saying “I got this on my own” is childishly selfish. So while I looked forward to overcoming the unexpected challenges the road led to, I also looked forward to sharing them, discussing them, and learning from Dave’s solutions.

 

That morning, we got up, breakfasted, and packed the bikes. Faith asked me to send Dave home soon as he hadn’t slept much (a long Covid effect), and he wasn’t 100%. Dave and Faith’s dog Dillan, a sweet and formidable Malinois, set the Kong of Assistance on Priscilla’s right footboard. I halp! We started motors, let them warm, contemplated the road ahead. Setting out to the nearest gas station, fifty feet out the driveway, I feel my left footboard fall away. We turn back to the house, unpack, and work on the repair. A bolt had sheared off, and a second was loose. We found replacements, and got her footboard and crash bar secured. This was the kind of break that would not have been easy to fix on the road. I’d have had to ride to a hardware store with no easy way to shift, holding my left foot up in the air, or tucked on my back peg. Priscilla was saying she didn’t want to leave Santa Fe, needed a few more minutes in Dave’s yard. Frankly, I suspect Dave had spoiled her considerably, with new wheels, new rear fender, new rear lights, probably a motor rebuild, who knows what else. But she was also being kind to me, snapping that bolt so close to Dave’s shop, where it was an easy fix.

Back on the road, we ride into the late-morning desert, bright sky and growing heat. Mornings like this out West have a particular feel: a lovely, easy warmth that makes me think of The Eagles songs “Peaceful, Easy Feeling,” and “Tequila Sunrise.” The traffic isn’t bad, and I look for my stride. Dave follows, listening and sniffing, probably judging my riding too, but he’s too gracious to comment. I keep Dave in my right hand rear view mirror, and hang a bit too far left in the lane for my comfort.

I am adamant to avoid highways and tolls. Thankfully, the highways in New Mexico have a secondary road feel to them, with little traffic and endless open space around.

Road trips on old bikes are a particular type of experience. In a car, you are insulated. On a new bike, you trust nothing will go wrong mechanically. On an old bike, your focus must include the bike's status at all times. Is that a new noise? Is that a new vibration? Is that dripping oil new? You look down as you ride to see if anything is dangling. You check oil levels and bolt tightness every fifty miles. You find problems and make decisions about what they mean. Was that bolt loose because it’s coming loose, or wasn’t tightened fully before? Will oil on my rear tire sidewall affect turns? On the first day, the mental strain of riding an old bike is heavy. You still carry the mental churn of daily life, the usual worries and concerns of life. However, your thoughts must focus on the general awareness necessary to ride a bike well, and through a world of careless car drivers. All this at once makes for a busy brain. But after a few hours, by the early afternoon, the mental chatter of daily life fades and you stop thinking about work, focusing on the road. The second day, you and the bike become one, so to speak, and you stop thinking about the rattles, sounds, and other worries. If something goes wrong, you will know from that peripheral vision part of thought and senses. Your mind empties in a lovely way, the periphery of thought occupied like a focus on breathing in mediation. By the third day, I will ride for long stretches without a single notable thought in my head.

 

Around noon, we ride through Las Vegas, NM, soon to have no municipal water supply. The West is burning and it is easy to see. Down a side road, we stop for coffee in an old Adobe building. The interior is brand new, decorated in fancy New England style. A Mormon girl at the counter gives us coffee and bean burritos with a smile. The coffee is excellent. She explains that a local (billionaire) rancher built the coffee shop, mainly for him and his local friends.

At Springer, NM, Dave and I part ways. He should have headed home earlier, but had too much fun riding together. Priscilla is running fine, though losing oil from her primary case a bit faster than we’d like. It’s a joyful, but hard parting. I wish he lived closer to Chicago.

I hit the road alone, and my head clears even more. I am no longer looking for Dave in my rear view. I move to the center of the road. So begins a pattern of riding for 50 to 70 miles, stopping for a stretch, gas, bolt and oil level checks. My ass begins to hurt in the same familiar places. My arms, hands and feet get used to the vibrations. It feels like being home.

The hills to the West of Springer (and mountains of Taos) fade in the mirrors as the Great Plains open up. The groves of trees thin out, and vast stretches of dry grass field stretch around in a flat 360 degree horizon. Desolate is the key word. Little towns poke up now and again—a few ramshackle buildings, closed businesses, the remains of a gas station, a few trees—but mostly the road is straight through the desolation. And it is hot. I can feel the sun on my black jeans and black leather jacket. I am not sweating for the wind, but I know that if I stop, I will fry. I am glad for the sunscreen Dave gave me for my nose, the only exposed but of skin, through the windscreen of my helmet. The road is feeling less Eagles’ Peaceful, Easy Feeling, and more AC/DC’s Back in Black.

Over 65 mph, the the vibrations are so strong it is hard to keep feet on the footboards. Like trying to stand on floor sander. I find a way to wedge my right foot between the crash bar and a bolt I added to keep my heel from sliding off. My right is less slippery, the gear shift linkage seems to keep my foot in place. I ride about 60 mph. The world goes by.

Priscilla stutters and starts to run on one cylinder. There is not even a shoulder on the road. I look for a tree to pull under, but there is none. I keep going. Put grumble putt grumble putt grumble putt grumble, Priscilla loses speed.

Up ahead I see a stone monolith that reads “Welcome to Oklahoma!” and I pull along side of it, Priscilla gasping out one last cough. Well, now I am in a pickle. The afternoon sun is fierce. I take off my helmet and jacket and put on my sun hat. So begins the problemsovling. Ok girl, what are you saying?

First, I take a long drink, emptying a water bottle. Second, I note that the monolith has shade on the back side. It is the only shade for miles. I take off all of Priscilla’s bags and push her behind the monolith. First problem solved. Two water bottles left.

Bad gas is my first guess. I had just fueled up a few miles back. I drain the float bowl, maybe water, add an octane booster if the misfiring is from low octane in their high-test tank, and think on it. But it can’t be. To confirm, I begin to check the plugs when I notice the green neutral light is hardly visible. I check the headlight and it won’t go on. So.

It’s not the gas, it’s an electrical issue. Near-dead battery. Why?

I take off the seat and check the battery with my voltmeter. I get numbers I can’t understand. 18 out of 50? Is that low or high? It must be low because the lights won’t go on. Voltmeter on the fritz? Am I reading it wrong? The charging system is likely out, so time to chase leads. Maybe a simple frayed wire, maybe a faulty ground. The voltmeter does seem to show accurate resistance, so the hunt begins. I follow the leads from the battery, one by one, and come across a slightly loose plug from the rectifier into the case. It looks melted. My heart sinks. I clean it off and push it back in place. I take readings that show a constant connection to positive, which is puzzling, and take pics of the plug. I send them to Dave for advice.

Then I wonder— if I can’t get her going again, which is seeming likely, considering melted wires and no battery, who is going to come pick us up on this lonely road? Who do I call? Google "Oklahoma Panhandle Motorcycle Tow Services"? There’s a campground about 5 miles up the road where I could crash, but pushing 800 lbs of bike and gear that far is a bit of a stretch. I drink half of my second water bottle thinking things through.

Dave replies with tons of advice, places to look and check, and offers bringing his truck to come get me, bless his heart. I know he just wants to join the fun, but he has work at home. He’s also exhausted. We debate options for solutions over the phone. He tells me to throw out my defective voltmeter, and get a real one in the next town. I decide it must be the rectifier plug, and maybe, in spite of being melted, a patched connection could last. I clean the plug, gently bend the wires into place, push it all back together and try to start her. Priscilla starts no problem and idles beautifully. The headlight comes back on. I let Dave know he can go take a nap, no need for roadside rescue, that the loose and melted rectifier plug was the problem, and that my patch is holding. For now. I am amazed at how simple the fix was. Dave is amazed at how simple the fix was. Thank you girl, for not stranding us. You just wanted to check how clever we were.

I load Priscilla back up, ride down the hot road feeling cooler and cooler and happier and happier every minute. I find a supermarket in a tired old town where I stock up on almonds, beef jerky, and other hard tack road food. I buy a Cobb salad and a can of coconut water. Guzzling the coconut water outside, I feel my shriveled body expand back to health. There are chunks of coconut in it. I spit the first one out thinking it’s a cigarette butt or a bug that got in during the canning process. But on recognition, I chew them down.

Freecampsites.net has recommended a lovely place a few miles off my road, close enough to roll in just at sunset, allowing enough time to get the tent up before nightfall. The heat has settled and the riding is a delight. We are back to Peaceful, Easy Feeling.

The directions take me down a poorly maintained dirt-gravel road, and I end up in the middle of a parched, cracked, sloping cattle field, not a person or campsite in miles. The strong smell of cowshit is in the wind. If someone camped there, well, good for them. Lumpy, hoof-pocked ground on an angled field, with no “permission” to be there, fertilizer in the wind, and no water spigot to replenish was too much. If I couldn’t find better, I’d hit the nearest Walmart parking lot.

Back on the road, I come up to Rolla, KS, and find a Corner Market on the edge of the town. At the counter inside, I ask the clerks if they know of a nearby campsite. They say they’re pretty sure I can camp in the town park, just three blocks down. I thank them kindly and go to investigate. At the first intersection, I see a Sheriff’s truck, so I wave him down. I’d rather have his permission than the Corner Market ladies’ goodwill. He tells me that Yes, “under normal circumstances”, people can camp there. I take that as permission and thank him, and promise not to light any fires.

I go three blocks down and get lost. There is a pool and a tennis court, but no park. I stop and ask two kids playing basketball where the town park might be. They are super friendly and point me the way with great detail, better than the ladies or the Sheriff. Maybe kids today aren’t so bad.

The park has picnic benches, fire pits, a shelter without walls, and a cinderblock building with toilets. No one is there. Hallelujah.

Wearing a headlamp in the gathering dark, I set up camp on damp grass. I eat my Cobb salad at a park bench and listen to the trucks rumble past on the highway. I call my wife Dinah and let her know I’m ok, and we talk our days through.

A large man walks out of the darkness, a small boy following him. My quietude is ruffled.

“Excuse me. Could I get a hand with my Gator? I got stuck.”

“Sure.” I put down my fork and follow the pair into the darkness, where I find a Gator ATV with its back wheels stuck in a drainage ditch. The boy is smiling at me, and I ask him if he likes the adventure of riding in the Gator.

“Yes!” he says and jumps in the passenger seat.

I push while the large man hits the gas, and they get out of the ditch.

“Thank you!” He says, and off they go.

Priscilla tucked and locked right next to the next, I lie on top of my sleeping bag in the warm night, unwind my back, stiff from the day’s ride, work in earplugs to make the truck air brakes just a bit more distant, and fall asleep like a little kid.

An amazing and lucky day done.

—

In the morning, I get up, use a washcloth in the cinderblock sink to make myself feel human, eat some jerky, and check Priscilla. She has no oil in her primary. Strange. I put a half liter in. Examining the gaskets, the usual source of leaking, I find everything tight. Strange comes back into my head, as the problemsovling kicks in. I have lots of oil, and can get more. So no big deal. But what does the leak mean? What is leaking and why? What are you trying to say now, girl?

I get on the road. The road is cool to the point of cold, beautiful and barren in the morning light. I have not a thought in my head. My senses just take in each detail of landscape, road, traffic and Priscilla sounds and shakes. I am not aware I’m taking it all in. It just happens. This is why I ride.

At the first gas station, I put more oil in the primary. At the second gas station stop, I put more oil in the primary. At the third gas station stop… the leak is getting so bad the left side of the rear tire is slick with oil. I’m worried a left hand curve will send me into the weeds. I text Dave’s 24/7 roadside assistance number to troubleshoot. I check the drain plug, and it’s tight. I check the blocked original hose, and it’s a wee bit loose, but not enough to piss out oil at a rate of a half liter every 100 miles. I’m thinking to take the primary case off and reseal, and scout gasket goo at a local truck stop. Where else could she be leaking from? The seal around the drive shaft? Dave replies that she can’t lose that much through the driveshaft, but there are no other holes to leak from. For a backup plan, I book a uHaul from Kansas City to Chicago, as that’s the nearest city with a 15’ truck. It’s still 200 miles from where I am, so I get on the road with a long way to go yet, probably into the night. Are you giving us a mystery leak because you don’t want to ride any more? Or are you testing our cleverness again?

North of Topeka, I pull over about 5pm for gas and another dose of primary oil. I am worried about riding into Kansas City at night to a closed uHaul place, where I will have to “check in” using my phone. What if it doesn’t work? What if I can’t get Priscilla up into the uHaul without help? Will I reenact one of those Failblog videos of the idiot riding his bike up a plank to have the edge of the truck bed catch the bottom of the bike, bring us to a screeching halt, before bike-and-rider tumble over sideways onto the pavement? I need a tape measure to measure distances, angles. I don’t have one. Will my headlamp battery last? Can I find local “youts” to offer $20 to help me push her into the truck? Will she let me figure out the oil leak instead?

In the gas station, for the first time on the trip, a Harley enthusiast approaches.

“Hey! Nice Shovel!” he says from 50 yards. He is about my age, white Fu Manchu mustache, sleeveless Harley T shirt, deep tan, bandana, sunglasses. S he calls out, he is climbing out of a dually truck that looks as beaten and aged as he looks. The man knows shovelheads at a distance, a good sign in my book.

“Thanks!” I call back. He comes over and we chat while I take off the primary case.

“You ride?” I ask.

“Some” he replies. Another good sign. He doesn’t try to impress with a long list of all the cool, expensive motorcycles he owns and rides. Instead he tells me how his wife has cancer that came back, how he used to ride with her, and how much he loves riding. His name is Justin.

“What’s the problem?”

“Leaking primary case. I can’t figure out from where.”

“I know a guy. Not far from here,” he says. “He might be able to help.”

“ANew Harley Mechanic?” I ask, doubtfully.

“No, old,” he stresses, and I trust him that much more.

“I’ll give him a shout,” and Justin picks up his phone.

“Yeah? What’s the problem?” a gravelly voice asks me over Justin’s phone. I explain everything.

“I’d look at it tonight, but it’s Friday, I done started drinking. Don’t put bikes up on stands after I been drinking. But if you bring it over, I can work on it in the morning.”

“Sure, thanks. Know of a place I can camp?”

“My backyard is fine, if you like.” I accept.

Justin says he’ll guide me to Dave’s shop, just a few miles away. I follow, feeling like I have a new and better plan than a uHaul 200 miles away. I have a pleasant smile in my head, for this is the adventure: who you meet, the unexpected places you go, where the road takes you.

I have friends who think this is crazy. Camping in parks? Accepting help from strangers? Sleeping in strangers’ backyards? Riding unreliable motorcycles through desolate places? They’d never do it. Too dangerous. Too uncertain. A snarky voice in my head wants to say what are you afraid of, life? I often joke “Uh oh, people” because in most circumstances I would rather be alone, or with loved ones. Modern city life grinds us together in horrible ways, bringing out the worst in our tiny, largely commercial interactions Do you want fries with that? Have a nice day. I get just as snippy as the people I fault for being snippy. But the vast majority of people are good and kind at heart. Serial murderers, narcissists, assholes, are rare, and even they can have good sides. So I trust in a basic underlying human nature. I also trust my gut. And Justin did not churn my gut in the least. He was as straightforward as a compass pointing North.

We arrive at Dave’s shop, a simple steel shed with a little sign, “81 Kustom Cycles” over the door. It is set on a patch of cracked dry brown land, surrounded by bean fields.

Dave comes out, beer bottle in one hand, cigarette in mouth, flashlight in the other hand, He says hi, and gets on his knees, and looks up around Priscilla’s chain.

“Wasn’t what I was looking for, but I can see up into your primary case here. Chain ate a hole in the case. Likely the reason why you’re losing oil. I don’t weld aluminum but I bet I could figure out a fix tomorrow for it. Likely a 6 hour job.”

A man with a giant bushy beard comes up behind Dave and says “I got a case that would fit that bike. Trade your for the one you got, and some cash. Lemme know in the morning what you want to do”, and he gets in his car and drives off.

Dave starts talking about old bikes, asking where I’m from, where I’m headed, about Priscilla.

Justin moves to leave, and I thank him deeply for getting me to Dave’s shop. “No problem. Never leave a biker on the side of the road.” A favor I won’t forget.

Dave and I go into his shop, and I suck in my breath. Next to the door, an utterly gorgeous mint ‘46 Knucklehead sits next to an utterly gorgeous mint ‘47 Knucklehead.

“I call those parts bikes. ‘Cause no two parts on them were ever originally together. I get the parts at meets and make the bikes out of them,” Dave explains with a chuckle through his cigarette.

“Don’t mind Ziggy. She’s a rescue. A little skittish. She’ll bark, but won’t bite.” The sweetest brown dog comes up and I give her pats on the head.

Looking around more, I see three pristine motors on his bench, a knuckle, a panhead and a shovelhead, lined up as if on display.

“Don’t rebuild motors myself any more. I got a guy who does ‘em.”

On a stand, there’s an early shovelhead, the seat on a post. It has the original air cleaner on it. Original early 70’s paint with rainbow striping.

“Rare bike that.” Dave explains. “One owner. Lives nearby. Put 30k miles on it. Only changed the oil. I’m rebuilding it for him. Think I’ll isolate the primary case. There wasn’t any metal coming out of it into the oil tank. Oh, the emblems on your bike are from a ‘58. If you like, I’ll give you $100 for each of them.” Dave proceeds to tell me tales of his work and his life for the next hour and a half, and I dwell on every syllable -how he started out with a shop at 19, fielding nitrous drag race. Then he worked as a race mechanic with Vance and Hines for a few years. Then he started this restoration shop. Left Vance and Hines because he hated airports and having to travel everywhere. I look around at hundreds of photographs of drag bikes, shaking hands with famous people, women with saucy smiles hanging their tits out of tiny bikini tops, trophies and other memorabilia. I feel as if I’ve stumbled into a major Harley holy site.

“Not much I haven’t already seen, kinda boring now,” Dave opines about his work. I fear he will stop working.

“Where’s your apprentice?” I ask.

“Nobody’s kicking down my door. Do I have to find one? My nephew was around for a while, but then he got married. I’m not such a good teacher anyway. Nobody asks good questions,” Dave rambled on. I wanted to apprentice with him. A rush of sadness hit me as I realized I’m watching the slow death of an exceptionally talented mechanic.

Dave shares a tomato from a friend’s garden with me. I thank him deeply for his insight into Priscilla’s problem, and wander out to set up camp before dark. The ground is hard as rock, cracked from drought. I wash my head and armpits with his garden hose, settle into a dinner of beef jerky and almonds, drink down a gallon of chalky Kansas well water.

I text with Santa Fe Dave and bring him up to speed. He is as agog as I am over what I stumbled into. The primary case hole isn’t a roadside fix. Dave says he will come to Chicago to pull the primary case with me. He wants in on the fun so much. I wish with all my heart he could be here in 81 Kustom Dave’s shop. Santa Fe Dave would boggle.

I call Dinah to let her know I’m safe and alive, and we talk our days through.

I fall asleep to the sounds of wind through the bean field, distant highway, and Ziggy’s occasional bark.

Another amazingly lucky day done.

—

I wake up to a red rising sun lifting through yellow-leafed beans. Dave told me it hadn’t rained in 120 days. I wash and eat and pack Priscilla up.

81 Kustom Dave had explained that if I used sticky chain oil, I could drive home with no oil in the primary case. Santa Fe Dave agrees that it could work, with the worry that the plastic adjuster block could melt. I sit with Priscilla for a moment and ask her what she wants. Did she bring me to 81 Kustom Dave because she wanted a rebuild from an expert? No, she says, not really, though that would be nice. I brought you here for his sticky chain oil hack so you can get me home. You’re going to rebuild my primary case and get to know me a whole lot better. It’s a deal.

81 Kustom Dave gives me directions to good motorcycle shop twenty miles North of Topeka for a particular brand of chain oil. I thank him deeply for his help and ask if I can offer him anything, which he politely declines.

Dan’s Cycle is a rare shop. A mix of new bikes and old ones for sale, including a 60’s Guzzi and some Hondas from the early 70’s. I explain what I’m looking for to the clerk, and who sent me.

“Dave? Well, you couldn’t have stopped in a better place,” the clerk notes. “He’s like the very best old Harley mechanic in the 50 states. He’ll give you good advice. He’s a good guy.” I take two bottles of PJ-1 blue chain oil and head back to Priscilla. Best in the nation? From the look of Dave’s shop, I have no reason to doubt it. A national treasure a few miles North of Topeka, KS, and Priscilla takes me there. Thank you, girl.

I get back on the road with a sense that everything is now working just fine on Priscilla (just don’t melt the plastic block!), but with worry that that other factors are shifting against us. The ride has been hot, but rain and cold are coming up. The clerk at Dan’s Cycle Shop told me a line of slow-moving thunderstorms were coming in around 1pm, that I could likely skirt them if I keep going directly East. However, if I strike North through them, stay a night in a motel to dry out, I could follow in behind them, dry, all the way to Chicago. This seems a sound plan, so I take it. I make a reservation for a Motel 6 in West Des Moines, IA that the clerk recommended. The Motel 6 clerk warns me that I must call by 6pm to cancel, or will be charged for the night. Des Moines is 260 miles away, a reasonable distance for a day’s ride.

Spittle hits my helmet as I leave Dan’s, though it’s only 9 am. I head East a ways and find a gas station with a roof to get my rain gear on. I check this and that on Priscilla and all seems well. The rain starts, then comes down in buckets. I decide to dally to avoid the worst of it, figuring it’s a passing shower.

A farmer towing a big cattle trailer pulls up to the opposite pump. He gets out, and starts fussing with the trailer wiring.

“What’s the matter?” I ask.

“No trailer lights! Can’t figure it out!” He replies.

I debate getting involved. I have a long road, through the rain, to get to Des Moines, and a dry, recommended motel room.

“Can I help?” I offer, timidly.

“Could you check if I have break lights while I hit the pedal?”

“Sure.” I go stand behind his trailer. He has no brake lights.

“Damn. What could it be then?” the farmer asks the wide world.

I’m involved.

I begin the curious social problem of figuring out how to be helpful with a total stranger. I don’t know what he knows about electrics. More than me? Less than me? I don’t want to add to his irritation, but don’t want to let him flounder. It’s a delicate ballet of letting him problemsolve, but trying to help, without touching anything. I feel a bit like Santa Fe Dave on the other end of the phone.

He checks the fuse box in the engine compartment, and replaces a few blown ones. There is a fuse for the left hand turn signal, but not the right hand one. There is a fuse for the brake light, but not the general lights. It’s confusing.

He buys a can of carburetor cleaner in the gas station shop and sprays the trailer wiring plug with it, hoping to clean out any crap that might have collected.

“Could you check if I have break lights now?”

“Nope, no lights.” I call back to him.

To get the trailer electric plug apart, he needs a tiny screw driver, and doesn’t have one. I happen to have one in my kit, so pull out Priscilla’s tools. I also pull out my defective voltmeter, which I had not yet replaced.

“You got everything in there!” the farmer exclaims.

“I need everything to keep her going!”

He pulls apart the plug to find five of six wires have pulled away from their terminals. None of the terminals are color coded, so which one goes where is a mystery.

My heart sinks, for now I can’t leave him with an electrical mess, taking my defective voltmeter and tiny screw driver with me. So I reconcile with the fact that Des Moines will be unattainable. On the other hand, I feel I’m paying forward Justin’s, 81 Kustom Dave’s, and Santa Fe Dave’s generosity within less than 24 hours. Never leave a bike, or a farmer's trailer, on the side of the road. It’s just a question of where to stay. I still had battery power in my phone.

“This one says the black is the brake light. This other one says it’s the brown.” The farmer looks up several trailer wiring diagrams online. They offer some, but not any definitive help.

I start checking for voltage and continuity at each terminal while he plays with the controls. He wires up the plug based on what I tell him each terminal does. But because the plug is backwards from the terminals in the truck, he gets most of the wires in the wrong place. So we wire the plug once, and get turn signals, but no brakes. Then we get lights and brakes but no turn signals. Then we get…. Finally, we draw maps in a notebook and walk through each, and Eureka! His trailer has all the lights working right. I use some of my zip ties to keep the plug in place, as he broke off the wire lock in frustration earlier.

I thought to ask if I could stuff the bike in his trailer, hitch a ride to Kansas City, and stay out of the rain; it was a hoot of an idea, an adventure in itself, but then I recalled the whole point of the trip. In any event, he was late for his grandson’s football game.

“My name’s Dave. Can I give you anything for your help?” He looks at me with the most sincere look of gratitude.

“Of course not.” Because of course not. I chuckle at the thought of telling him he owed me money for helping. Farmer Dave smiles, says Thanks with the most sincere look in his eyes, leaps back into his truck, and squeals a tire getting back on the road. Having pushed back selfish instincts, and seen the benefit to another person so clearly and directly, left me in a mood to pin a medal on myself. In the meantime, the rain had stopped. Mostly.

The ride towards Kansas City got rainier and colder the closer I got, until it was mid to low 60’s and pouring by the time I hit the city limits. My rain suit kept me warm at first, but slowly it showed its limits. Little leaks here and there started to add up. The velcro collar around the neck tore out its stitching the third time I tried to take it off.

I put my magnetic tank bag into a black garbage bag to keep it dry. That worked well, until the wind caught a corner of the garbage bag and yanked the tank bag out of my lap and right off the bike on the right hand side. It rolled to an on-ramp lane. I pulled Priscilla over and ran back, watching cars woosh towards me in the rain. I got to the bag, picked it up and walked back along the shoulder. No one had driven over it. While the plastic bag was torn up, nothing was broken inside. Just one granola bar was shattered to dust. What kind of luck is this?

The sticky lube solution seemed to be working fine. No smoking primary. No melted plastic. I stopped worrying so much, but faithfully lubed the chain every 70 miles.

The map said to follow I-35 through Kansas City and straight into Des Moines. I followed the map. As I got closer to the city center, the semis got thicker, the spray off their tires came more often, the idiots who didn’t see me more common. Trying to merge back onto the highway from a gas stop, I found cones limiting the road to one lane. I sped up to fit between two cars, but the one behind wasn’t having it and sped up to cut me off. He went past on my left with inches to spare. I swerved right to avoid him, then saw I was headed straight for a cone. I swerved back left just in time, the cone top snapping my knuckles hard, but not enough to destabilize Priscilla. This is, I believe, one advantage of a heavy bike. I doubt the impatient driver realized that he nearly killed me, nor did he look at the middle finger I gave him as he sped off. I rode on.

Reaching Kansas City, in heavy rain, I discovered that I-35 simply comes to an end, with an “exit now” sign. I exited, and found myself in the poorest part of Kansas City. I stopped in the parking lot of a Restaurant Supply Warehouse, pulled out my cell phone to try and make sense of the map, but my fingers were too wet to make the phone work. Pulling at dry cloths from my tumbled tank bag, a row of children stood nearby and stared at me, as if I were alien dropped from the heavens. I tried to say something through my helmet, but it was garbled and they didn’t reply.

I found on the map that I had to take the exit for the highway going East to St. Louis first, then choose another highway going North to some other place, then another exit for a route West to get to I-35 North again. Thanks, Kansas City, for the total lack of rerouting signs.

Back on the road, the rain grew dissipated and the temperature dropped. I pushed on. Maybe I could make it to Des Moines after all, not until 8 or 9 pm, but that was all right as long as I stayed warm.

In Bethany, MO, I stopped for gas, and noticed my hands were shaking with cold. This was not good, as warming up inside wouldn’t last too long once back on the road. I checked the outdoor temp and it was low 50’s. I had 103 miles to go to Des Moines, and was not going to do it without the mental fog of cold. Years earlier, I had nearly killed myself pressing on when I was cold and wet, getting so mentally confused that I forgot what the kickstand was for when I came into a gas station, ending up under my bike on its side. That was one mistake I would not make twice.

Then I noticed my headlight was out. Both high and low beam. No riding into the night, then. Santa Fe Dave had already sent me a twelve-page wiring diagram/explanation of Priscilla’s electrics, but I would not read it with shaking hands, in the dark.

It was 5:50 pm. I called Motel Six to cancel my reservation. They put me on hold for five, then six minutes... “Wow, you just made the cutoff. By two minutes. Canceled with no charge, Sir. Good evening.” The Motel 6 clerk was impressed with my fine timing. I was too.

I ask the clerk in the gas station if they were to stay in a nearby motel, which one would it be?

“Last time I was in the Family Values,” a young lady with lots of earrings and purple hair said, referring to the motel just outside the gas station, “they had like cockroaches and bedbugs and shit. Not good for business.” I got the impression that she wasn’t referring to the Family Values Motel business. An older woman who seemed to be her supervisor looked at her hard, then recommended the Super 8 across the highway. “That one’s better.”

Riding over the the Super 8, I got stuck behind a brown Dodge Caravan from the early 90’s that seemed lost, and reflected that state by driving at 11 mph, across lanes, blinker on, blinker off, blinker on, brakes on constantly, and mostly in my lane. Instead of roaring around them, I just slowed down and let them figure it out. They eventually turned into the Super 8, and I suddenly had a horror that they were looking for the same last room that I was. The Christian in me died at that moment and I parked Priscilla with speed and walked into the lobby well head of them. I had zero appetite for roaming Bethany for another motel, hands shaking, no headlight. I hoped they had reservations, or were lost and drove back out of the parking lot, or were picking someone up, and that I was doing them no harm.

There was no clerk at the desk, so I called the number indicated on the hotel phone. Then an older couple walked in and stood in line behind me, probably from the brown Caravan. We both waited, awkwardly, silently, for the clerk to arrive. When he did, there were apparently plenty of rooms. My selfishness abated, my Christianity returned. I chatted up the old couple. They were heading from Des Moines to Branson for some good vacation. We talked about the weather, all the fun that could be found in Branson. They were friendly and didn’t seem to bother that, while they drove first into the parking lot, I got to the desk first. They told me it would be clear skies tomorrow, and my ride should be better. I thanked them for that.

The room like manna from heaven. I have not taken such a long hot shower in years. They had a washer-dryer down the hall. I put everything in the dryer, wearing only my plastic rain suit up and down the hall to get there and back. Children in the hallway would see me coming and turn around. I thought about mock-growling at them, but smiled and laughed instead.

On a bed t hat felt like it was made of feathers, I slept like a child, once again grateful for the simplicity of the road, the people I met and helped, the people who helped me, even the couple heading to Branson, from who I kind of took help.

Another amazingly lucky day done.

I woke to clear blue skies, not a cloud in sight. It was 50 degrees outside, but the promise of a brilliant, 70 degree ride day ahead. I was near jubilant.

The Super 8 had a breakfast nook. I decided to make waffles. But who the fuck knew I had to spray oil all over the thing before putting the batter in? I made a horrid mess that would not come out of the iron with the plastic knife at my disposal. I scraped, scraped, to no avail. No one was at the desk. I left the mess, and had a bowl of raisin bran instead.

Packing up Priscilla, the rain drying off her with the rising sun, I had a good feeling for all that would come next. Looking at the weather, with a major depression sitting over Chicago for the nest two days, and reports from Dinah that our basement had flooded with sewage, I felt the call to be home sooner than later. I decided that we’d ride to the edge of the rain, to Tennessee, IL, pick up a uHaul there, and drive the rest of the way into the city with both me and the bike dry. I reserved a 10’ truck with a trailer, which I was sure I could get Priscilla on, but figured I could switch to a 15’ truck with a ramp if conditions suggested I could get help getting her up the ramp.

The road East out of Bethany, MO is an utter motorcycle delight. Seldom-traveled country road through rolling hills, not super curvy, but past the most beautiful, quiet farms. Northern Missouri is now a favorite realm for me. “Trump 2020” painted on the side of a collapsing house, and a “Let’s Go Brandon” flag in front of another spoke to our political divide. Country and City have never misunderstood each other more. I rode along in peaceful equanimity, and was happy.

Rolling into Tennessee around 4pm, I got into a debate with Priscilla. The skies were clear, the weather lovely. What if we camped one more night, Priscilla? Then, Monday, tried to get a bit closer to the bomb cyclone over Chicago before renting a truck? Maybe even riding through a little cold rain as a last step? Three inches had already come down, how much more could there be? I flipped a quarter, heads we camp — and the coin tumbled through my fingers and landed squarely on Priscilla’s transmission tails up. She had spoken. Let’s get home.

Brent, the uHaul rental guy, was friendly. I asked if I could get a hand pushing the bike up the ramp into a 15 footer, and he said sure. So I asked him to change my rental to a 15’ truck. No problem, he had three 15’ trucks on site. While he did paperwork, I got Priscilla’s bags off her. Then Brent pulled the 15’ truck around and put her rear wheels into a drainage ditch. That made the ramp nearly horizontal. I simply rode her in, strapped her down, and set off to Chicago as the sun fell towards the horizon. I’d be home by 10pm.

The first annoyance was to discover the fuel level was 5/8, not “full” as Brent had told me it was, and as the contract said when I glanced at it. Oh well, got tricked. A few extra bucks on gas was no big deal.

The second annoyance was that Google maps sent me down thirty miles of the very worst pothole-filled roads in rural Illinois—the worst roads I had seen all trip—just to get to the highway. I had to slow down to 25-30 miles to prevent Priscilla from jostling loose from her straps. Every bang and rattle felt like an insult to her.

Then, reaching the highway, the car shenanigans started almost right away. Worse than on a bike, Fuck the Truck seems to be the attitude of many cars, especially Jeeps, BMW’s and muscle cars. Diving in front of me, speeding past and nearly cutting me off. It was relentless, and only got worse the closer I got to Chicago. Road annoyance turned to sparks of anger turned to a conscious effort to avoid rage. I was no longer on a serene motorcycle ride, but right back in the mixmaster of modern city life. How it grinds us together in horrible ways, bringing out the worst in our tiny interactions.

Though the clouds were utterly spectacular, imposing, dark and beautiful, it did not rain when the weatherman said it would. In fact, it didn’t rain once driving into Chicago. At first this pissed me off, as I likely could have ridden even with the cold temps. But the closer I got to Chicago, the happier I was to be in the truck. Twenty miles out, the idiots came out in full force. Cars would come from behind at fifty miles over my speed, cut across my nose three lanes to peel around another slower car. I thought Fuck, if one of them hit me on the bike from behind, I’d be toast. Large sections of the highway had no shoulder. I figured if I had a problem with Priscilla, there’d be nowhere to pull over, or even get out of the way of the mayhem. Were she to stumble and need work, we’d be sitting ducks in a bumper car hall.

The truck and I lumbered home, Priscilla quiet in the back. Arriving, after a huge hug with Dinah, we put the end of the ramp up on bricks and I rode Priscilla down and into the alley without a problem. You're home, girl.

Then the real shenanigans started. I looked at my contract to find Brent had changed the dropoff location to a store way out of town. I called UHaul to change it back to the location I had chosen, only 15 minutes away. It was 11 pm, I was exhausted from the road, and I apparently called a uHaul help line on another planet, as our conversation tended towards the unreal.

“You want to change the dropoff location for your 10’ ruck rental?”

“I don’t have a 10’ truck. I changed it to a 15’ truck.”

“You mean the one from Kansas City?”

“No, I canceled that rental. I’m trying to return the 15’ truck I rented in Tennessee, IL.”

“Oh, no. You have a 10’ truck out from Tennessee, as well as one from Kansas City.”

“No, I don’t have a truck out from Kansas City. I don’t have two trucks. How could I rent two trucks? I never picked that one up. I canceled it. I did pick up a truck in Tennessee, IL. I made the reservation there for a 10’ truck but changed it to a 15’ truck. I have a 15’ truck I am trying to return. Please help me return this 15’ truck….”

“You don’t have a 15’ truck, sir. Let’s forget about the one in Kansas City. You have a 10 truck from Tennessee, they can be hard to tell apart.”

“No I don’t have a 10’ truck.”

“Fine. Read me the number on the side, then sir.” The clerk sounded more tired than I was.

“DC 1899.” I spoke carefully into the phone. I hear a pause.

“Oh. Oh. Shit. You do have a 15’ truck. That’s a 15’ truck number. How the….” I hear the clerk say, with some awe in her voice. “That’s not right. No. No. That’s not good.”

“Are we on the same page now?” I ask.

“Oh no, sir, we’re way off page on this one.”

I look at my paperwork. It says 10’ truck. Fuck. The first time I don’t read the paperwork carefully, I get the wrong truck, with the wrong gas, going to the wrong drop off location.

I begin to panic. They’re going to charge me with theft… taking the wrong truck from the lot without Brent’s permission…. They’re going to melt my credit card.

“Can I just return the 15’ truck I rented, pretty please, and we’ll call it good?” I ask in my smallest voice.

Over another hour, after speaking two two clerks, we come to the understanding that uHaul understands nothing of what is going on, and will ask Corporate to get involved, and contact me within 3 business days. Corporate can’t be good. All I have is the truth on my side, little evidence for it, and I know how little that counts today. This is asshole puckering of a bad kind, unlike acceleration on Priscilla. The exhausted clerk gives me a new place to return the 15’ truck that I should not have, and Dinah and I make good on that.

We get home around midnight, and collapse asleep. It is good to be home, though the smell from the basement is pretty strong.

Another amazing, somewhat lucky day done.

—

The next day, I get a call from uHaul Corporate. The fellow is apologetic, kind, listens to my story, and immediately offers credits towards future rentals. He says he will look into any surcharges that might be in the system, and erase them. He says he hopes my experience isn’t reason to give up hope on Uhaul. You could have knocked me over with a feather.

I think we've all come to expect the “I gotta fuck you before you fuck me—that’s how to get ahead in life” attitude in business, if not in relationships of every kind. We recently dealt with a refrigerator repairman, an old customer, and a corporation that used that approach to business with us. To solve something that wasn't perfect and clear, they aggressively put themselves first, and left us with a large bill for nothing.I hate this approach to business and life, but accept that it’s part of human nature. I have that little voice in my head too— call it “being guarded” combined with “getting ahead” — it pushed me to jump for the Super 8 check in counter in Bethany. But the more I can recognize it, and ignore it, the better. Had that couple gotten the last room in the Super 8, I would have done something else, and it would have been fine in the end. The better me would have waited patiently behind them at the Super 8 desk, to see what fate dealt.

That Corporate uHaul didn’t take that approach is exceptional, amazing, and really speaks to hope for us all. They could have said Ha! We have a contract that you signed! We can totally screw you! And they likely could have, charging who knows what penalties and fees, and I would have been helpless to fight them and their team of lawyers. But they didn’t. I mean, I have yet to see my final credit card bill… Until then, though, even the very end of this trip looks blessed in ways I could hardly have imagined starting out, knock on wood.

Repairing a Refrigerator in 35 Days or More

Life in 2022 America brings so many challenges.

On the one hand, maybe an ex-president kept top-secret nuclear codes because he felt keeping them was his right, or they were valuable to sell. Or maybe the FBI is a totally corrupt, libtard-controlled organization hell-bent on destroying America's best chance of becoming great again. I dunno what to do about either scenario.

On the other hand, maybe Russia is gonna nuke us tomorrow because they have the historical right to rule from Portugal to Japan. And apparently America stands in the way of that. Should we? I dunno. What do the Portuguese feel about it?Should we listen to them?

On a third hand, maybe China is gonna invade Taiwan tomorrow, then the rest of South East Asia, because it's their historical right and the Colonial powers have been mean to them. And apparently America stands in the way of that too. Should we? I dunno.

As a voter, I should spend my time informing myself on these topics, to help put mature, informed, and responsible people in office to make the hard choices.

Instead, what takes most of my time, mental capacity, and money, is my refrigerator.

Apparently, our consumerist culture demands it, to keep the economy going and keep our mega-corporations mega-profitable, and to keep me from choosing mature, informed, and responsible political leaders.

I've even written a poem about it, maybe borrowing a word or two from W. B Yeats:

How can I, that broken refrigerator there,

My attention fix,

On Roman or Russian

Or on Chinese politics,

Yet here's a traveled man that knows,

What he talks about,

And there's a politician

That has both read and thought,

And maybe what they say is true

Of war and war's alarms,

But O that I were young again

And held cold food again in my arms.

 --

As I write this, Dinah and I are on day 35 of trying to fix or replace our refrigerator. So far, we have paid several thousand dollars to repairmen and mega-corporations. In return, we have acquired a glimmer of hope for a working fridge, perhaps by this afternoon, perhaps in another 10 days, or who knows when really.

Snark aside, what part of this kleptocratic circus of blank global-economic stupidity do we like? How have we, "the greatest nation in the world" have come to be systemically incapable of fixing or replacing a refrigerator? We merrily dance along to this economy in ways that make the movie Idiocracy look like a best-case scenario going forward.

Hello People?

 

Chapter 1: The Dying Fridge

Our Odyssey began July 19 when we noticed the ice in the freezer was soft. I listened for the compressor and heard nothing. I fiddled with the controls and found them unresponsive. The LCD display flashed strange words that had nothing to do with "cold". I checked vents to see if they were blocked, and they weren't.

The fridge was 12 years old, in otherwise perfect condition. My sister has a fridge in her basement that was made in the 1970's that is still running. A 2010 vintage should have generations to go, I thought.

For a day, I hoped the fridge would get better. It just got warmer.

So, it was time to fix it.

 

Chapter 2: The DIY Repair Effort

I make things for a living. I take apart and repair woodworking tools and machines. I've restored two 60's cars and a 70's motorcycle. Fixing a fridge would be new, but I thought I had the basic skillset to learn as I went.

Foolish me.

I thought the major obstacle was time. A woodworking machine can wait on parts. Our fresh lettuce could not.

First, I did not call the manufacturer or look in the manual. I knew where that would go -- after a three hour wait on hold, a minimum-wage KitchenAid employee would read monotone from a script through various troubleshooting steps (Is the fridge plugged in?), eventually advising me to get a repairman, as something was broken, which I already knew.

Instead, I started by looking for a shortcut on YouTube. Within minutes, I found a video of a fellow puzzling over the same strange words flashing on an identical LCD display. "Probably the control board," the Youtube expert told me in a calm, authoritative voice. So I believed him.

Listening to some fellow on Youtube is not a good way to solve a problem. Who is he? What does he know? Who is paying him? But among the unreliable flotsam and jetsam, I have occasionally found good tips with a favorable risk-benefit ratio. If the circuit board was a $15 item, I'd buy one, slap it in, and see if the problem went away, thereby avoiding the long process of really understanding what was wrong with the fridge, and coming up with an accurate solution.

I followed up the Youtube video with four hours of online searching for an electronics parts schematic. Kitchenaid really doesn't want the little guy to know how the fridge is wired, as I never found an electronics schematic, just mechanical ones. Are they kept in a vault under Fort Knox?

I found a reseller that, based on my fridge's serial number, offered a control board for $380, minus tax and shipping. They promised it was "in stock" and could deliver in 5-10 business days. Now, this is a hand-sized green circuit board with a few diodes, resistors and such poking out of it. $380 for a circuit board that likely cost $3 or less to manufacture? Even factoring in transportation, taxes, duties, inventory, overhead, this price is incomprehensible. Considering what spare parts cost in the 70's and 80's (and companies were profitable then, in spite of being much less efficient), there is something amiss to the price for that little circuit board.

And ten business days? We were supposed to leave on vacation for a week in three days. I had to fix the fridge before then.

I called two Chicago-based shops, but neither had the board. They said they could order it, but neither could give ma firm delivery date.

I thought through next moves.

And what if Mr. Youtube is wrong? What if the compressor crapped out, and not the control board? I'd drop $400 on nothing. I had no way to test the control board, and wasn't even sure if I could. To fix the fridge properly, I also needed some kind of schematic for the electronics and compressor, but could find none online. Did I want to invest in circuit board testing equipment and knowledge? Did I want to pull the entire fridge apart to create my own wiring diagram? Not really. I had other demands on my time.

The simple, inexpensive DIY fix was not an option.

 

Chapter 3: The Repairman Effort, Part 1

Dinah and I decided on plan B -- give some money to a local repairman who can get the job done before we go on vacation.

Dinah found one with good Yelp reviews named Richard, the Appliance Professor. He told her couldn't come out for a week, that he was too busy. But then I texted him with the part number for the board, wondering if he happened to have one on hand that we could buy, and install ourselves, in a simple DIY fix that might work?

I got a text back almost immediately that yes, he had the board, and would come by in 1 hour, and would be happy to install it.

Dinah and I cheered! Problem solved!

Richard switched out the boards, and the fridge compressor started running again, but the LCD panel remained blank, and not programmable. Richard fiddled with this, fiddled with that, then said he'd have to get another, accessory board, which he could have in a few days. He claimed that with new circuit boards, our venerable 2010 fridge should last another 10 years.

I learned from Richard that fridge manufacturing had slowly gotten worse over the last twenty years. He told me my fridge model was designed to last about 12-15 years. He told me that fridges built 5-7 years ago were built to last about 10 years, and that fridges sold today are built to last about 3 to 5 years, before major repair or replacement.

This boggled my mind. Our society grows more disposable, even in the face of climate change? I don't quite see how manufacturing a new fridge every 3 years for the same American home is more efficient with natural resources than using the same one for 50 years. If we want the "latest features", can't we give a working fridge to someone else?

But, I felt on the edge of beating the KitchenAid obsolescence strategy. Our fridge was cold but not programmable. It would last until we got back from vacation. Richard would put the second board in. We'd fix our old fridge, and be done for 10 years, save the environment a little bit.

I paid Richard $850 for his troubles: two circuit boards (one installed, one on order) and his labor. I am staggered by this cost, but understand it. That same money could buy a new, albeit basic, fridge. Just to fix two small circuit boards.

 

Chapter 4: The Repairman Effort, Part 2

We came back from vacation to a dead refrigerator. The light came on, but otherwise nothing. I had forgotten what the stink of rotting meat and vegetables was like.

I call Richard. He doesn't reply. I text Richard. He doesn't reply. I get a hold of his partner who says they haven't gotten any accessory control boards in. I research buying an the accessory control panel online, and find it is no longer manufactured.

Five days after we get back, Richard finally replies, and will be right by to "reset" the fridge, and the accessory control board is "coming soon," maybe tomorrow.

I know how it is in the trades -- you answer the fire before you. I'm not too annoyed by Richard's delay in response. It's all too typical as he's juggling too many dead appliances all at once. But I have growing concern we are not going to see the accessory board, that Richard may be bullshitting us, as he has made promises he can't keep.

Richard arrives, unplugs the bad accessory circuit board that was apparently telling the new, good main circuit board to shut down, and the compressor comes back on. He says he knows that they don't make the accessory boards any more, but has his guy working on a remanufactured one, and he'll be in touch.

After he leaves, we realize the freezer works, but no cold air is being blown up into the refrigerator area. We call Richard. He doesn't reply. We call again. He doesn't reply....

After five days of transferring blocks of ice from the freezer to the fridge to keep the veggies and meats cool, we give up. I can't repair it. Richard won't. It is time for a new fridge.

 

Chapter 5: The New Fridge From Home Depot

Dinah and I look at fridges online. We like this one. We like that one. A thousand bucks gets you a basic white fridge, but for something with features in pretend-stainless, you're looking I $2500, $3500, $4500, and $5500.

I look up brands and models on Consumer Reports. No fridge company gets better than a 3/5 for reliability. Just as Richard said, Consumer reports tells us to expect major repairs within 3-5 years.

A $5000 for a fridge designed to last 3-5 years? Who does this profit? Not the consumer.

We settle on a "reasonably-priced" fridge. We decide to use our local Home Depot to buy it, as no independent seller in Chicago has one.

We drive to Home Depot, work with a kind and helpful employee, and are given a delivery and installation date a week ahead.

Waiting a week for a fridge isn't a big deal, really. But think on it. When I was a kid in the mid 70's, I recall my grandmother buying a fridge at some store in Milwaukee. Later the same day, the same sales guy and a partner delivered it. They carried it up her stairs, too (she lived in a duplex). When she passed away in the late 90's, I helped settle her estate. The same fridge was in her kitchen, still cold. The couple that bought her house didn't seem to have any plans to replace it. Today, with all our progress, we wait a week for a fridge delivery.

The week passed, and the delivery day came. Home Depot was very detailed with sending checklist emails for installation (will it fit through your doorway? Does the water line have a shut off valve?) and sending text message updates for the delivery van's location.

Before the Home Depot deliverymen arrived, I did the following: 1. moved our building's garbage skip out of the way of the back gate, 2. Removed our chairs, plants, and carpets from out back deck. 3. Took our back door screen closing mount off the jamb. 4. Took our back door off its hinges. 5. Removed the kitchen carpets. 4. Moved the coat rack and shoe rack. 5. Emptied our ailing fridge and cleaned it out, transferring everything to our neighbor's fridge. 6. added a shutoff valve to the water line in the fridge area (cost $14), because Home Depot said it was their policy not to install any fridge without a shutoff valve in the fridge area (our shutoff valve was under the sink, three feet away).

The Home Depot truck arrived at 10 am, when they said it would. Three very friendly movers got the fridge onto the ground and took it out of its box. The base panel of the fridge had a huge dent in it, and a scrape across the entire width. Curiously, the cardboard box over the fridge showed no sign of damage whatsoever.

"Sorry man, we'll take this one back" the cheery delivery guys said. "Home Depot will call about replacing it. Shouldn't be more than 3 days."

Then I 1. moved our building's garbage skip back to the back gate, 2. Replaced our chairs, plants, and carpets on our back deck. 3. Replaced our back door screen closing mount on the jamb. 4. Rehung our back door. 5. Replaced the kitchen carpets. 4. Moved the coat rack and shoe rack back. 5. Refilled our ailing fridge, transferring everything back from our neighbor's fridge. 6. Left the shutoff valve to the water line in place.

At the end of the day, having heard nothing from Home Depot, I called the kind and helpful employee who sold us the fridge. She wasn't there, so I spoke to another employee who told me that 1. Home Depot had nothing in their system as the delivery men had to return the actual fridge to the warehouse first, and then it would need to be scanned into the system. Then it could be considered "returned". 2. When they had it back in their system, and returned, they had to accept the return. 3. If they accepted the return, they would then process a replacement, and at that time, would put us into line for a new delivery date. I asked how long this process would take. "The return acceptance should take about two days, and if you don't hear from us within three days, please call back."

I (calmly) pointed out that this seemed unreasonable, to wait for Home Depot to replace the fridge at their convenience. The poor employee then explained to me that they had no control whatsoever over the delivery of their appliances, that they were done by a third party company. I pointed out that I had bought the fridge from Home Depot, but that logic didn't seem relevant. Whether she wanted to or not, she couldn't do anything about it, and I believed her.

The kind and helpful employee who sold us the fridge also called me back to offer a more clear assessment. It would likely be 7 to 10 days before we saw another fridge. She tried to cancel the current order, and put in a new one, but that only shaved a day or two off the process, with some risk of buying two fridges.

I checked online and found that Best Buy could get us the fridge in 2 days. I called the kind and helpful employee from Home Depot to ask why Best Buy could get us a fridge in 2 days, and Home Depot needed 10 days to replace one. She admitted that she had no answer, and couldn't do anything about it, and I believe her. So I cancelled our order with Home Depot for a full refund, and made a new one with Best Buy.

 

Chapter 6: The New Fridge From Best Buy

When I made the order with Best Buy, I asked the clerk if their promise of 2 day delivery was real, or if it had a chance of sliding forward to 7 to 10 days after I gave them my money. He let me know that they had a bunch of them in the warehouse, and that it should not be a problem. I decided to believe him.

The morning of the delivery, I 1. moved out building's garbage skip out of the way of the back gate, 2. Removed our chairs, plants, and carpets from out back deck. 3. Took our back door screen closing mount off the jamb. 4. Took our back door off its hinges. 5. Removed the kitchen carpets. 4. Moved the coat rack and shoe rack. 5. Emptied our ailing fridge and cleaned it out, transferring everything to our neighbor's fridge.

The Best Buy truck arrived at 3pm, when they said it would. The very friendly movers (not the same as the Home Depot movers) got the fridge onto the ground and took it out of its box. The base panel was not dented. It looked like it was new.

They took the doors off the new one. They hustled it upstairs. They took the doors off the old one. They hustled it down the stairs. They put the doors back on the new one. They took the shutoff valve off the water line, as it was useless to them, and attached the water line to the fridge. hey plugged it in. The fridge made an annoyingly cheery "ding ding ding ding", and would not stop.

What's the problem? I asked. Interior light won't go off when the door is closed, the delivery guy said. He took off a panel and fiddled with a control panel.

Ding ding ding.

He fiddled with it, dinging incessantly, for a half an hour. I began to imagine them taking the doors off and hustling the new fridge down the stairs and back into the truck, telling me Best Buy would be in touch about a replacement delivery date, 7 to 10 days out.

Ding ding ding.

I began to wonder if we would ever get a new fridge and if, statistically speaking, anyone can. Are they all defective and returned? Is this just an endless dance between consumers and megacorporations, in which we pay them and they promise cool new objects that they never actually deliver? This strategy would save on R&D costs, as the fridges would never have to actually work.

The dinging stopped. The tech said "wow, never seen that before. It was a sensor, gummed up. Fixed it. Light goes off now." And it did.

They cleaned up. The fridge felt as if it was getting cold. I signed away my rights.

 

Chapter 7: The New Fridge

Opening the new LG, the highest rated Consumer Reports brand, everything felt lightweight and cheap compared to our old Kitchenaid. Flimsy plastic this. Flimsy plastic that. The drawers make bottom-end Ikea feel like custom-made aircraft cabinetry.

To remove the packing material, I had to remove a shelf. But the shelf was accidentally glued to the back of the fridge in one spot. Prying the two plastic parts together, everything twisted and pulled apart, so thin and fragile. Miraculously, I popped the errant glue spot without breaking anything. But I can see that this new super-expensive fridge will not last more than 3 years, even if the control board and compressor keep going. I don't think it can stand the wear and tear of having a half gallon milk box placed on a shelf, or a head of lettuce placed in a drawer. It's just not built to last.

Then, with the new fridge beginning to feel a little cool inside, I 1. moved our building's garbage skip back to the back gate, 2. Replaced our chairs, plants, and carpets on our back deck. 3. Replaced our back door screen closing mount on the jamb. 4. Rehung our back door. 5. Replaced the kitchen carpets. 4. Moved the coat rack and shoe rack back. 5. Refilled our ailing fridge, transferring everything back from our neighbor's fridge. 6. Left the shutoff valve to the water line in place, though Best Buy said nothing about it.

The last item I pulled out of the fridge was, you guessed it, an Arbitration Notice. Apparently, I gave away legal rights by putting a head of lettuce into my new fridge. Magical! I wonder what I lost by walking through my front door, or lost when I got into my car today? Possibly the right to live in a nation with the rule of law.

Now I have even less time to think about politics. I have to find myself a lawyer to use my fridge the way I did in the 70's. Let's start with the simple things, an get to the politics later.

Start at Repair.org if you're interested in your rights to repair.

 

 

The Power of Holding a Koala

My mother lives in Perth, Australia.

Perth is just about as far away from Chicago as one can live, without wintering over in Antarctica. If she sought a job there, I doubt she'd have been offered one, as she's 88 years old and doesn't enjoy cold weather. So that left Perth. I don't take it personally that she moved there. She followed a wonderful Australian man down there. She wasn't running away. She fell in love. But that's another story.

My brother-in-law was explaining to a coworker where my mother lived. That it was far away. That it was exotic. The puzzled reply was, "Do you mean Perth, Franth?" He explained the difference, the different geography, but only partially cleared up the confusion. One has baguettes. The other has koalas. One is East, the other South and East, or West. One speaks French. The other sort of speaks English. Oh, the coworker said.

 

Part 1: Travel Heaven and Hell

Do you know how long it takes to get from my apartment in Chicago to my mother's house in Perth? Let me count the hours.

1. Our Apartment to O'Hare Airport: 45 minutes in a pleasant Uber, at rush hour, through stop-start traffic.

2. Chicago O'Hare Airport, Terminal 5: 4 hours of rugby-scrum security, TSA monotonously yelling at cowed crowds to take their laptops out, belts off, shoes off, and no you can't take water into the airport. Then, a three-hour wander around overcrowded, poorly-designed, badly-managed, shithole of a terminal hallways that smell of damp, gum-stuck carpet, with no food or drink on sale after 7pm, unintelligible loudspeakers, no seats that aren't free, or sticky, no luggage carts so we carry our stuff everywhere, mostly incompetent airport staff that scream at the top of their lungs at people to do this or that, most passengers sitting on the floor wearing bedroom soft clothes and wired into their phones. The signage is terrible, hard to know where to go, the most accurate signs are paper ones taped to walls by employees who still give a damn. The design of the place feels rabbit-warren, closed in and oppressive. Ceiling panels are askew, some with wires falling out, all are dirty. Even the brand new addition in Terminal 5 feels like a slightly wider hallway in a crappy mall, half of it used as storage for a huge collection of temporary room dividers. Expressions of exhaustion, indifference, annoyance and anger on nearly everyone's faces. I wonder how long the broken moving walkways, yellow police tape at either end, have been broken. The airport feels like a microcosm of American society today. Who will throw the first punch to start the total conflagration? 

How it is, as a nation, that we are not ashamed of our infrastructure, is beyond me. Oh wait! The billionaires in charge don't go through regular airport terminals! They have no idea of the shitty quality of our infrastructure! Duh. And so it makes sense to the Average American that spending money on our public spaces is a liberal waste of cash.

(To note, on our return, we spent 2 1/2 hours standing (never sitting) in a customs and immigration line at O'Hare, 0.9 miles long according to my Fitbit, in poorly ventilated hallways, and a series of rooms, surrounded by painfully screaming children because they couldn't go to the bathroom without losing their place in line. The first O'Hare staff member we talked to knew nothing, other than to tell people to stay in line, though she wasn't sure which line, and wasn't challenging anyone who was skipping it. The second staff member (one with "ASK ME QUESTIONS" printed on the back of her jacket) kept her back to me when I asked, politely, if she knew what forms we needed to fill out before immigration, and where I could find them. She wasn't giving any more out, was her surly answer, to someone else across the room. When the immigration officer asked for the filled out form, I explained what airport staff had told us, and he didn't reply, looked disgruntled, and filled it out for us....and perhaps only 3/4 of the visible TSA officers checking passports, the rest stood around, chatting with themselves leaning against walls (if you're going to do that, do it behind closed doors, not in front of exhausted passengers, unless sadism is really part of the game). Really, I saw no one working at O'Hare airport who looked happy.

Anyway, who has seen better? The rest of the world is a worse shithole, no?

 

3. Qatar Airways Economy Class, Chicago to Doha: 11.5 hrs. sitting in a new 777, run by polite and efficient staff, in reasonably comfortable seats, with a good but limited movie collection, three heavy and perfectly edible meals, and all the drink we can manage. Not a exceptional flying experience, but a perfectly good one (an 8 out of 10, if I would rate the average American domestic flight experience around 3 out of 10, with their hard-ass seats, stressed-out flight attendants with forced smiles, and unpredictable schedules).

4. Hamad Airport Layover, Doha, Qatar: 7 hrs to burn in an airport. As we get off the plane, Qatar Airways staff are holding up signs for all connecting flights, to help guide bleary and disoriented passengers. Are those free luggage carts to move our stuff around easily while we wait for our connection? Yes! Thank you! The Information kiosks are staffed, not empty. The people in them speak perfect English and have useful answers to our questions about where to find what. They look us in the eye and smile. We go through security to get to the main terminal, and the employees are amazingly efficient, polite, well-dressed, and no one yells at anyone. Staff, for the most part, look genuinely happy.

How is this possible, I ask myself, used to American standards of airport experience. Aren't these "guest workers" in Qatar treated terribly, paid terribly, away from their families and home countries, and struggling to get by? Aren't our American airport employees at home, among friends and family, paid relatively well, and have lots of rights through their unions, and if no union, then a choice of other jobs if they don't like one? Are the Qatar employees terrorized into seeming happy in their jobs, and the Americans actually happy with all their privilege, but just come off as surly, indifferent, even sadistic? Help me out here. Why should I not believe my eyes, ears, and nose?

We arrive at 5pm and the terminal is quiet, almost empty. The cavernous halls are gleamingly clean, the empty waiting areas huge, and filled with what look like comfortable seats and even some reclining chairs. By 2 am, when our flight for Perth leaves, the airport is crowded to capacity, filled with people from all over the world, speaking every language, wearing every kind of clothes. We mill past each other in huge crowds, but never feel shunted or close in or kept from where we need to go. As nothing gets in the way, the airport reveals its smart design. Everything just works. The shops are a bit maze-like, intentionally, so you wander them. But finding your way out, and towards where you need to go, is easy. The design adds to the experience of being in a special place, as the art should do.

We take a lovely shower in a lovely spa for $20 each, and it is worth every penny. Is there free Wifi? Yes, thank you! Is that a room with day bed that are free to use to sleep and only half are in use? Thank you! All shops open 24 hours. Wait, what? Thank you! The weird giant teddy bear in the great hall is disturbing, and the big restaurants are all under renovation, but the food halls are adequate, and the beer cold, if costing $16 for a pint.

I have seen better. The rest of the world is apparently not a worse shithole, but actually nicer.

We Americans need to travel more to understand that we need to up our game.

 

5. Qatar Airways Economy Class Doha to Perth: 13 hours in a new 777, run by polite and efficient staff, in reasonably comfortable seats, with and extensive movie collection, with three perfectly fine meals, and all the drink we can manage. A 9 out of 10, if I would rate the average American domestic flight experience around 3 out of 10). I just wonder why the movie collection was limited on the Chicago leg.

6. Perth Airport: 1 1/2 hrs. of deplaining, walking through an older but well-maintained terminal, then through small but gleaming duty free shops still open at 8pm, then through passport reading machines that work, no lines, then waiting for luggage for a bit, then competent customs people asking logical questions about what we're bringing in, then meeting my mom and her partner in the small reception hall. Perth airport is nothing to write home about, but it is well-managed by people who seem to care.

7. Perth airport to my mom's house: 30 minutes. A drive on the wrong side of the road with little traffic, through roundabout after roundabout.

Welcome to Australia.

Total transit time: 38 hours.

We left our apartment on Tuesday at 4 pm, and arrived at my mom's on Thursday at 8 pm. Somewhere, somehow, Wednesday got lost.

 

Part 2: Why We Travel

The primary reason for the trip was to visit my mother. We talked. We connected. We made meals together. We fell asleep on the couch watching TV together. It was good. Travel is always about people. Sometimes, though, it's also about the animals.

On our eighth day in Perth, we went to Caversham Wildlife Park, where, for $20, you can hold one of these:

Now, Koalas are having a tough time. They're losing their habitat at a rapid clip, and are now officially an "endangered species". They also have to face down the occasional minister of tourism who asks us to "forget the piddling koalas" and enjoy other aspects of Australia, as they are "flea-ridden, it piddles on you, it stinks and it scratches."

We beg to disagree.

James was his name, and my wife and son each got to hold him for a spell.

The looks on their faces as the park ranger handed James over, were magical.

James touched noses with my son. I doubt he'll ever forget that.

I looked on, watching my son gently hold that plump koala, imagining how he felt the warm weight, that special charge of care. I remembered holding him when he was tiny. I saw amazement and care and joy in his face, and I knew that he will make a great dad, if he ever chooses to be one.

I looked on, knowing my wife's hugs are pretty special, and hoping James could appreciate them a much as I do (but deciding that particular anthropomorphism was likely inaccurate). James was probably wondering wordlessly who they were, and if either of them had eucalyptus leaves on offer. I saw her glow with appreciation at James furry weight.

Almost shaking with excitement and joy, we left the koala compound wondering what office to submit our Bid to Adopt papers for James.

We wondered aloud what the world would look like if Putin had held a koala when he was growing up.

We hugged my mom harder when we got back to her place.

Handmade Purpose: The Power of Workmanship in the Digital Age

In 2018, I started a book project, and blogged an introduction here. But, after beating the digital pavement for a publisher, and finding none, I went onto other things.

Well, now a publisher has picked it up, MS due in June of 2023. Here is my updated (long-form) elevator speech, and I'd appreciate thoughtful comments:

What if the meaning of life was simple? What if we could find it in making useful and beautiful objects for each other?

After all, toolmaking is the hallmark of our species. Our most-ancient ancestors made them over 3 millions years ago. Modern human tool use exploded 300,000 years ago. Today, we have industrial robots that weld parts for space rockets. The making and use of tools is in our bones, so to speak, and core to our success as a species.

You may say “Now wait a minute. I find making things frustrating and difficult. I can’t make anything good.” You’re not alone.

Social evolution and industrialization have estranged us from our hands, and many of us scarcely know what they’re capable of. But if you are human, you are wired to make beautiful and useful things. It’s in your nature, baked in over millions of years. You can learn the great satisfaction that comes from mastering valuable skills. Making things for each other is the essential act of kindness that has helped us thrive thrive as a species. It can help us thrive as individuals.

 

Handmade Purpose: The Power of Workmanship in the Digital Age is about finding an enduring sense of thriving in life by developing your fundamental nature as a maker.

This book shows you how to master workmanship, opening the creative process, in anything and everything you make.
It’s about how easy it can be — making for humans is like flying for a bird or swimming for a fish.

It’s about the joy of learning to make, the delights discovery and problem solving.

It’s about the rich, joyous feeling that comes with saying “I made that,” when what you have made is useful and beautiful.
When we listen to what our hands can do, and make something for someone we love — a meal, a song, a sweater, even a set of chairs or a whole house — magic happens.

It’s about the simple joy of being human.

Strother Purdy is an almost-academic, a lifetime woodworker, a writer of three other books, a teacher, a father of two, a husband to one, a motorcycling enthusiast, and planter of googly eyes on random advertisements.

For any deep divers, some more thoughts on craftsmanship are here.

And my podcast here -- interviews with people who have mastered a craft, and people who haven't, about where they find satisfaction in life.

--Thanks to Paul Hochman for some much needed editing!

Wiggly Eye Progress

Everything, Everywhere, All at Once is now my favorite movie.

On the first viewing, it edged out my previous favorite movie, Blade Runner: The Final Cut, which had edged out Blade Runner: The Director's Cut in 2007, which had edged out Blade Runner in 1992, which had been my favorite since 1982. Got that? Good. Let's move on.

I left the theater enthralled, laughing, delighted, It was as if I had left my brooding, atmospheric and angry youth behind, choosing instead a full embrace of the joyful absurdity and liberating meaninglessness of life. I sort of had, already, when I was in my 20's, but this movie confirmed the move. Mind you, I still love Blade Runner: The Final Cut.

From now on, I fight like Waymond. Ok, I've been fighting like Waymond for some time, without realizing that I was fighting like Waymond.

Kindness is the most powerful tool to resolve conflict and troubles.

Here are some recent efforts in public places, mostly on the EL in Chicago, but also in a private home.

The homes of friends and family are rich hunting grounds for wiggly eye applications:

 

And I am happy to report, that the movement grows. I stayed at a hotel and found this on the bed.

The best places to place googly eyes are where everyone is having the worst time.

We recently spent 2 1/2 hrs at O'Hare airport, waiting in line for customs and immigration. The halls were poorly-ventilated and hot, and there was nowhere to sit.

So I googly-eyed the cloth railings in a dozen spots, just in case any exhausted eyes wandered down.

Forwards and onwards, folks, to remind the world of what a silly place it is.

On losing a true friend

Andrew Engel

1961-2022

 

Andy woke at 5 am every day, Owen shaking his nub tail with excitement when he stirred. Rising, Micah, Gus and Owen would all follow down the stairs to watch him make that first pot of coffee, then bring a cup up for Pat. Stepping outside with the dogs into the cool darkness of predawn, Andy would just breathe it in, and find a moment of quiet, lovely peace at the start of a new day. For Andy got on with life. More than anyone, he understood that nobody was here to save us. Everything was up to us; and he chose his Everything better than anyone I know. Every morning, getting up more likely around 6 or 7, I wondered what Andy was up to. I'd often already find his comments on the day ahead in an email, among thoughts from the other Assholes. And thereby I could step outside my door, and breathe the day in.

Oh, a friend! How true is that old saying, that the enjoyment of one is sweeter and more necessary than that of the elements of water and fire!

-- Michel de Montaigne

Andy and I worked together, talked together, and laughed together for over 25 years. For the last fifteen, as part of a group of six, we emailed daily. He became a true friend, and our friendship grew with time. I feel his loss as if both fire and water had gone out of the world.

Andy gave so much, to so many. That his heart gave out on a random day is a wretched, unacceptable injustice. His family, his community, his profession, his friends, each feel a gaping hole of absence that is profound, and profoundly different, for each.

This is an essay on the loss of a true friend.

---

Smiling wryly at his own wit, my 11th grade English teacher ended each class at the bell commenting that "Our discussions do not end. They stop temporarily. See you tomorrow." I often wanted to smack him for the refrigerator-magnet wisdom. At the same time, I remembered the comment, and learned to notice the difference between something that stops, and something that ends.

Since Andy died, the most common painful thought has been precisely this difference. I see an unintentionally ironic advertisement on a train platform, and want to share it with him, and make him laugh. I complete a project in the shop and want to send him a picture of it, hear his thoughts on it. I want to ask his advice on a relationship matter. But each of these conversations has ended. Worse, when I remember looking forward to a planned visit, I realize that I can no longer look forward. That pleasant memory has become a liar, a ghost of things that will not happen. I feel betrayed by my own thoughts.

Did I tell him, as well as I could ever find the words, how much I appreciated his friendship? I no longer have the opportunity of completing that conversation. Was I fully the friend that I wanted to be? Our friendship is no longer open to amendment, or coda. Our friendship is complete when I had hoped of building more with it. I fight against this end by having conversations in my head. We sit at a bar over pints. I conjure his smile and laugh. I conjure his pauses, his puns.

He will be with me in my thoughts.

---

Agency. Choice. Who we are, and what we become. The unity of rights and responsibilities. Kindness. Gratitude. Respect. Trust. We discussed and distilled so much of life, over so many years, the process deepening our capacity to live.

He and Pat modeled a thriving marriage, a major ingredient in making possible my second, thriving, marriage.

Honest and vulnerable conversations shape who we are. When we listen, we choose, and we change. The ephemeral byproduct of such conversation is a debt to identity. When we can say I would not be fully who I am without my friend, we have a true friend. Andy was my true friend, and I am diminished by his loss.

---

Last Fall, at his 60th birthday, Pat hired a bagpiper. Andy was pleased as punch. Today, I asked the same bagpiper to come back for his memorial gathering. I asked him to play Amazing Grace.

We will toast his life with uisge beatha, or whisky, around a bonfire, and mourn the loss of water and fire in the lives of all his friends.

A Milestone Project

A month ago, I delivered the final piece of furniture I'll make in my shop in Connecticut. It was a Tudor-style bed in walnut.

A grand milestone project, I am most grateful to my clients for their patronage, and their timing in the commission.

Now the shop is dismantled, the contents moved to Chicago. I look back on my old shop with much gratitude and appreciation.

Thank you Connecticut Shop, for your partnership over the last 22 years. You were an excellent workspace, and more than I could hope for. I wish you well going forward, and hope your next partnership is just as fruitful.

 

9: 26 foot uHaul Truck

30 Objects in 30 Essays

From the objects that I have made, objects other people have made, objects that I live with, and what they have to say. The products of hands and brains. The obvious differences between things and words. The tangible and intangible rewards of effort. Use and beauty as the two primary qualities of objects, words, hands and brains. For through objects we make the stories of our lives: a life made, a life bought, a life well-used, a life beautiful and useful.

Kris Kristopherson's "Best of All Possible Worlds" was playing when my wife and I walked into Parson's Chicken & Fish. We were exhausted and exhilarated after the move of my shop from Connecticut to Chicago. We celebrated with delicious chicken sandwiches and cold beer.

The moment was perfect, and I came close to tears. Instead, a broad, laughing smile emerged. Indeed, it was the best of all possible worlds. The best of all possible moments. The convergence of a gargantuan effort into a singular completion. Twenty-five years of collected shop equipment and lumber had been winnowed, organized, packed, loaded into a truck, driven 900 miles, unloaded into a new shop, and the truck returned. Thank you Dinah. Thank you Andy, and Mike, and Mike, and Kevin, and Aaron. Thank you 26-foot long uHaul truck. Murphy was AWOL and nothing went wrong.

Though I only met and lived with this truck for three days, it is, and will remain, one of the most significant tools I've used in my life. My workshop became a moveable feast within its 1745 cubic feet of cargo space. At an average speed of 55 mph, all the objects of my 25-year history as a maker floated three feet above the pavements of Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Uprooted, disconnected, and uncertain, the future of 9000lbs of my personal density and self-understanding depended on that truck. Had we, at any time, left the parking brake off while near a ravine, or had the key snatched from my back pocket in a rest stop, it was conceivable to watch my shop trundle off into oblivion. What that meant was hard to fathom. Of course, I am not defined by my tools or my work. And yet without either of them, what and where would my place be? For three days, a big part of my life was nestled uncertainly within a truck.

---

The Truck

Dinah and I named her Katy May, and Katy May was a champ. At first we doubted our name choice as potentially discriminatory (we hadn't inquired by what gender the truck wished to be identified), but the name stuck as she continued to prove herself a dignified, excellent and worthy Katy May. At no point did she shirk the task we set before her. She didn't overheat, break down, or whine. This was understandable, as she had only 3900 miles and still smelled of factory vinyl in the cab. At 12 ft. tall and 34 1/2 ft. long, she had ample opportunity to get into mischief with low bridges and sharp corners to hit things, compounded by the addition of the car trailer. But she proved reliable and sensible. She had just one minor sideswipe of a stone wall on her way out of Connecticut, the trailer kicking sideways, perhaps a parting shot to the ashes of the past.

Picking up Katy May up, I ask about the 11 ft. 6in. clearance under a railroad bridge about three blocks away. The two clerks' faces light up.

"Oh yeah. We have a lot of problems with that!" says one with a wry grin. The other's face falls a bit dark.

"Really? Like how often?"

"We lose a truck about 6 times a year. Sometimes just the cargo box, sometimes the truck is totaled. No matter what we say, how much arm waving. People still try to go under. The insurance doesn't cover that, you know. I forget the term."

"Something like lying negligee?" offers the other clerk.

"No, it's liable negligence," the first clerk corrects. She looks up at me. "Your fault. You pay," she notes, handing me the keys.

"Wow. OK. Sure. I'll avoid that bridge. Um, know of any other low ones in the area?"

"Nope."

I took the key and paperwork, and decided to look up as I drove, religiously.

---

The Old Shop

A good friend and I had been discussing dog training, specifically a dog's understanding of the command "leave it." With it, my friend was able to get a dog to walk away from anything and everything -- even a ham sandwich already in it's mouth. At the command, the dog would drop the sandwich and act as if the ham sandwich did not exist, or ever had existed. It was miraculous to watch. We considered the usefulness of such a command in our lives.

In one drawer, I had an Exacto knife set given to me when I was 7. The scar on my left index finger, crossing two knuckles, attested to how much I misused that knife as a boy. I had not taken it out of its box since I was 12. All of the spare blades were rusty. Would I ever use it again? Why would I take it to Chicago? Would Isaac or Josephine appreciate inheriting the Exacto knife set that dad cut his left index finger with? I packed it in a box, unable to hear any voice say "Leave It".

A lifetime of collected tools and materials boiled down to a singular funnel of choice: would it fit in the truck? How close to the weight and volume limit would any one object bring me? Katy May's cavernous interior said "LOTS," but I had too much.

It became quickly evident that the biggest weight was emotional. I didn't need a truck. I could sell everything in Connecticut and use the proceeds to buy new in Chicago, saving the truck rental costs. But I just couldn't leave it. I had sawn that flitch in 2002 from a tree on a friend's front lawn. That was my grandfather's spokeshave, stolen from my dad. That was a handplane given to me by a author for helping him prevent an asshole publisher from cheating him. The posters on the wall were from my college days. The list of meaningful items went on and on and on, indicating I had an above average problem with projecting emotional value onto everyday items. Marie Kondo would note that I was "a hard case."

"Tell me to leave it," I asked him. But he refused. Apparently, I was supposed to have more agency than a dog. I had to tell myself to leave it. Sorting everything into Keep, Sell, Giveaway and Toss piles took weeks. Objects moved back and forth from pile to pile. In the end, the hardest part was tossing a bunch of items that had been in other piles, but found no new home. There was no room for them on the truck, and yet I had only found other people who could say "leave it" to themselves more effectively than I.

---

The Driving

Katy May and the trailer combined were as wide and nearly as long as a tractor trailer. It was harder to keep her within the lines, harder to change lanes, harder to speed up, harder to slow down, harder to park. On certain pavement, she bounced rhythmically, making our voices sound like a party trick. The trailer required we go a maximum of 55mph, which we did, with cars and trucks passing us at 70-75mph most of the way. White knuckled, we asked ourselves continuous questions. Are we still in our lane? What is about to hit us? What are we about to hit? What clearance is that bridge? Look up!!! Is the engine laboring on this hill? I remain impressed that we were not required to have CDLs, or advised to take Xanax, to rent her.

At gas stops and other moments of calm, Katy May would ask: What will you do when you get there? She'd remind me of what was in her cargo space, of her purpose. Let's just get there first, I'd say, putting another $200 in her tank.

---

The Arrival

The uHaul place in Chicago was right off the highway, a blessing from heaven. We dropped off the trailer before taking the truck to the new shop. Making city corner turns with the full rig was not a prospect I had relished. With the truck alone, it would be tricky enough, winding my way through the small local streets, needing to swing wide, with annoyed Chicago drivers dodging around.

As he checked in the trailer, I asked the clerk about low bridges, if any were between us and Ravenswood.

"Low bridges?" he looked at me funny. "None that I know of. Look, if you want to total the truck, lots of people just do it in the lot here. Can't fuckin' tell the difference between drive and reverse, holy shit...."

---

The New Shop

Completion of any task is just one step, unprivileged in my opinion, among all the other parts and moments. I love to start jobs, projects, big and small. I love to feel the progress when I'm doing them, and change with them, as they evolve and mature. Completion is satisfying, also unnerving, for it begs the question "what next?" And I have not experienced anything quite as unnerving as the completion of 22 years of shop work in one place. I have also not experienced anything as viscerally satisfying as completing this shop move.

The concept of "perfect" is terminal. Any change can only be for the worse, as there is no "more perfect." To preserve perfection requires, essentially, the death of the object, for a living thing is constantly changing. I don't like to think of anything as perfect until I am done with it, in the sense of burying it. Completion is death, a departure from the present. It can only remembered.

Transient moments can be enjoyably perfect. One such was walking into Parson's. They are born and die in a few seconds. That overwhelming feeling of gratitude and joy, a blanket of stress falling to the floor, the realization that the work is done. These moments are singular, And not a thought to the future. The New Shop Will Be. It is not now.

Thank you Katy May for getting us to the verge of the uncertain future, safe and sound.

...

The Definition of Gratitude

Driving back home from Parson's, sitting at a stoplight in what felt like our truly tiny Honda CRV, I looked up to see a tiny, inconspicuous sign. It was next to about four other signs indicating which way to turn to various local attractions. The tiny, inconspicuous sign read "11' 6" CLEARANCE". Just above it were the power wires to the stoplights, crisscrossing the entire intersection.