The Joy of New Wheels

We recently acquired a 2009 Nissan Rogue (ruffian, evildoer, criminal,badass.) The contrast between our old car and the newer one hits the senses with impact, particularly the smell of the interior  and it takes me back to another era.

It was springtime, 1964. The warm spring air bore the fragrance  of the newness of life. Neighbors were mowing grass, emitting one of my favorite aromas. It was warm and I was girl-crazy. What a time to be alive!

I didn't realize that we were getting a different car until the Sunday that we got it. I went along with Dad for the bi-weekly ritual of filling the gas tank of our 1954 Chevrolet. Dad drove us down the street to Tony and Pete's Standard Service. He drove up to the pumps and Pete Larson came bounding out of the service station in his pinstriped coat with 'Pete' embroidered under the Standard Oil insignia. He also wore a matching pinstriped skull cap.

"Fill 'er up, George?"

"Just three bucks worth. The summer tires are in the trunk. Will you change 'em?"

"You betcha," Pete was wiping the windshield. "Check the oil?"

Dad nodded.

"Sure is nice to see some warm and sunny weather after that awful winter."

"Yeah, our coal bin is just about empty. Had enough of winter, for sure."

Pete pulled out the oil dipstick from the motor and squinted at it. "Half between 'add' and 'full'. If the motor was cold it probably would be three-quarters." He closed the hood. "when do you want to pick 'er up?"

"My boy can get 'er tomorrow after school if that's all right."

"Okay by me. Thanks, George."

Dad started walking away from the service station. I was baffled by Dad's logistics, as he seldom walked. He had a heart condition and the cardiac benefits of walking had not yet been realized by the medical establishment.

"You coming or not?"

I ran a few steps to catch up and I had no idea what Dad was up to and I lacked the temerity to ask. We passed the Daily Globe and continued to the intersection of McLeod and Lowell, rounded the Allender Motors building and then we went through one of the service doors of this Ford dealership. We went from the spring brightness to the fluorescent gloom of the service bays. The odor of grease and gasoline and the pungent residual of primer and lacquer. The shop was neatly kept. Tool chests on castors rested in front of the inactive workbenches.

An old man emerged from the office (he must have been at least fifty.) I recognized Bill Limaaka from church. He always was chatting and laughing with someone after the service was over. Winsome and easy to talk with, ever maintaining his clientele base. I thought Bill should have been in politics.

 Good to see you, George." Bill extended a hand and then turned to me and extended me the same courtesy. "You must be old enough to drive," he said with an avuncular smile. I always liked Bill, but this was my first encounter with him.

"Well, there she is, George," Bill handed Dad the keys to a light blue 1962 Ford Galaxie sedan. "Go and try 'er out for a couple days. I think you'll like 'er. We cleaned 'er up real good, waxed 'er and the inside is fresh and clean. She's just like new and only eighteen thousand miles."

Dad got behind the wheel and I went in the other side. The doors closed with a tight, solid thud. I was used to the rattly doors on the Chevy coupe. The engine was barely audible when Dad started it, another stark difference with the Chevy.

Bill knocked on Dad's window and Dad rolled it down.

"I didn't tell you, George but the brakes are power-assisted, so just a light touch does it."

Dad backed the Ford out of the garage in jerky fashion until he got the hang of the brakes. He headed right back to Tony and Pete's. Pete came out right away. "Holy cow, George! What do we have here?"

"She looks brand-new. I won't even have to wipe the windshield, it's so clean. V-8 engine?"

"Yup, go ahead and pop the hood."

"Yup, that's a 292. That's been a real good motor, George. I've serviced a lot of 'em.Gonna take 'er out for a spin?"

"I'll try 'er for a few days. Put in five bucks regular, ok?"

"You betcha."

I think Dad really stopped at Tony and Pete's to show it off. I wondered if he was going to trade in the old Chevy. It was rusted badly, lacking rocker panels and the front seat rocked slightly because of the rotted floor.The windshield had a crack in it and it's paint was dulled by the severe winter. I had driven it many times already. Dad first took me to the cemetery to get the hang of driving the stick-shift. I killed the motor a few times and ground the gears before my right hand and my left foot got synchronized. I had driven it to the cottage in Mercer once and Mom said she was so nervous that her feet were curled up the whole trip.

"Gonna trade in the old buggy?"

"I don't think I'd get too much for it. Rusted out pretty bad, but the motor runs good. You know what? I'll let my boy have it."

I felt my jaw drop. This was too good to be true! But it was true. I could see that Dad meant it.

"It's a fixer-upper, but you can take care of that," Dad said with a little chuckle. "That's your birthday and Christmas present for the next three years."

We all had a good laugh.

When we were ready to leave Dad launched another jaw-dropper.

"You drive." He handed me the keys.

I got behind the wheel, adjusted the rear-view mirror and located the ignition, to the left of the steering wheel. I almost launched Dad through the windshield with my first touch of the power brakes, but I quickly adjusted to the brakes and the power steering.

It was like driving inside a cloud, no rattles, a responsive motor, easy steering. I had the urge to hit the gas and see how responsive it really was but I played it safe. It was a good time, a time I'll always remember.

The present is not parallel but similar. We had the 1995 Taurus for almost eighteen years. Motor was still running as strong as the day we bought it but a rusted body and underside necessitated a different car.

There's a thrill to turning the key in a crisp used car and a strange challenge to learn how to operate all the bells and whistles that have become vogue in the last eighteen years. For example, the shifter is on the console. The last time I drove a car so equipped was in my 1967 Mustang. In the Nissan I activated the windshield wipers, front and rear when I wanted to put the transmission in Drive. A month later I am still tripping over that. Old habits die hard.

It's the same cycle. The old, faithful sedan rusts to the point of no return, in spite of its strong drive-train. The luster is gone and the luster of newer cars carries us away. We commit to monthly payments that strain the budget. With our loved ones in lower Wisconsin and lower Michigan, that commitment is necessary.

The last time we saw the the Taurus it was in the dealer's lot bearing a sign, "$1599.00. Runs great! Only 102,000 miles!" It also bore a 'hold' sign under a wiper. It wasn't there for long, closing a long chapter in our car ownership. By the way, we got $700.00 in trade and the dealer only told us the negative aspects of our car. Didn't mention that it runs great. That's why he's rich.

God's Laws of Physics

The cold weather had been distressing. On January 1, 5:00 p.m. the other night - shift worker called to ask if I could take her place since she has the flu. (You must find someone to work your shift.) Of course I consented, recalling how someone helped me last winter when I was in agony with the stomach flu.

Around 8:30 I took each of the dogs for a short outing. I'm careful of the possibility of frostbite in their paws. After the dogs were squared away I went to plug in Lois' car. I lifted the garage door and flipped the light switch.  Darkness!

Next I said a short prayer for my truck which sits outside. I hadn't started it for over thirty-six hours, but I had the heater plugged in.
Didn't matter as the truck only made a zapping, clicking noise.

Now the problem was to restore power to the garage. I checked the fuse panel in the garage and from there I went into the basement and checked for a tripped circuit breaker. Next I started to check each junction box on that circuit. I was in and out of the house several times without success.

The pressure built and I was  sending up prayers as I needed the truck to start and I needed electricity so I could try to charge the battery. After checking the connections in each box I went outside to see if the garage lights came on. Frustration set in and anger followed as it was now 9:45 and my shift started at 11:00.

My heart beat faster with the urgency of the situation. I would try Lois' car to jump-start the truck. The old Taurus started like a champ. The truck would not.

"What do you want me to do," I prayed angrily, as I put the Taurus back into the garage.

Back into the basement. I shut off the power to the garage and checked several junction boxes.  This time I twisted the wire nuts to ensure a good connection. It was ten o'clock and I knew that I wouldn't make it to work.

Back outside, I found the garage lights were on, so now I would connect the battery charger to the truck. Problem was, I had locked myself out of the truck so I couldn't release the hood. (Expletive) There was another set of keys hanging in the house. I would call work to explain the situation. With phone in hand I punched in the numbers with great difficulty. My arthritis reacts when I work outside, bare handed. My hands were also trembling from anxiety and anger.

I explained my plight and I got some help. The assistant manager would cover my shift, bless her heart. I told the person working the desk to convey my extreme gratitude. I took the extra keys and got into the truck, although it was painful for me to turn the key.

I was shivering violently and it was difficult to connect the charger to the battery, but the connection was made. I set the charger for a slow charge. By the morning this truck would start.

After I was in our warm house for a while I began to warm up and my thoughts quit whirling. I took a cup of hot tea upstairs and I had no sooner  changed into pajamas that the phone rang. It was the assistant manager. She needed me to walk her through the computer audit.

First I apologized for not making it and she was gracious and sympathetic to the point of putting me at ease. I walked her through for about the next forty-five minutes and the day ended well. I slept well and the next morning the truck started.

I realized how screwed-up my thoughts were the night before. Why did God let the power fail in the garage? Why did the night turn into a hellish cascade of events?

I realized that God had nothing to do with that. Things happen, following the laws of physics, which He established. I realized how foolish I had been. When there is a negative situation and my mind whirls it, whips it into a catastrophe. The devil whispers, "You can't fix this...God caused this, you know. After all He's in control."

I've fallen into that trap hundreds of times. When will I learn? I apologized to God.

Workouts in Ironwood's Crown Jewel

The latest polar vortex and the mild (single-digit) weather between vortices have curtailed my running. Yesterday the mercury rose to a torrid zero. I observed a woman running down McLeod Avenue against the wind of fifteen to twenty-five miles per hour. The chill was in the minus twenty-five to minus thirty-five degree range. The woman was thinly dressed in tights and some kind of light parka, a ski mask over her face. I don't have any tights and my parka is military surplus survival gear so I don't run when the wind chill has reached insane proportions. My last run outside about a week ago was in sixteen degree weather with light winds, ideal running weather.


My polar vortex running is done inside, in the Memorial Building, Ironwood's crown Jewel. I train in a  subterranean gym, constructed in the early 1920s. It has a balcony for spectators and the floor is a regulation basketball court. An adjacent locker room facilitates a change into shorts and a t-shirt and a hoodie until my body warms up. I store my snowmobile bibs and survival parka and heavy Sorel boots in my favorite lockers. Yes, I have a little OCD that makes it important that I use 2 particular lockers, sixth from the end, one locker above the other.

This morning the gym was illuminated by the cloudy day showing through windows on the west and north sides of the gym. The windows are about fifteen feet above the gym floor. The east wall separates the gym from the swimming pool that has been inactive since economic conditions prohibited its continued use. Above the gym and pool, in the first floor is the auditorium with a stage and a hardwood floor. The balcony is wonderfully appointed by stained-glass windows and individual armchair seats.

I had tried to pace off the boundaries of the basketball court but I didn't think that my pacing gave an accurate judge of the distance covered with each workout. I had initiated a routine of running the gym floor seven times, with each run a little closer to the opposite sideline. I judged that if I repeated this nine times (63 sprints the length of the court) I had covered a mile. I finally remembered to take my twenty-foot tape rule along and measured the court which turned out to be 40' by 80'. A little math showed that it took 66 sprints to a mile so my estimate was close. I ran a total of  198 sprints, equivalent to 3 miles. I ran 2 miles , then played basketball, shooting until I made a shot then running to the other end and repeating for fifteen minutes. then I ran another mile and the estimated equivalent was four miles including the basketball interlude.

It was chilly in the gym due to the brutal conditions outside. Even with the overhead heaters blowing it was still cold so had had my hoodie on for the first half-mile.

When the Memorial Building was constructed  in 1922, I think, there probably would have been intramural games, as the present high school hadn't been built yet. Maybe the St. Ambrose catholic high school played there. At any rate I envisioned the facilities, pool and gym used with great enthusiasm when this building was new.

The whole building was renovated several years ago and the basketball floor refinished. Modern basketball goals replaced the 1920s goals.

I love the quietness of the gym. The sounds of city administration and the Social Security office do not reach down the two flights of stairs and 33 stairs to the gym. Sometimes I sit on a sideline bench, enjoying the solitude. sometimes I pray. The quietness makes my workout a calming mini-retreat.

Strange that I should find running as one of my passions. As a kid I struggled through gym class with an asthmatic wheeze. Even as a young adult I did not have the stamina for basketball or for running one city block. I'll give science part of the credit in developing medicines that freed me from my asthmatic burden. Working only two or three days a week gives me the time to run.

There's a thrill in hearing my footfalls on the hardwood court as I accelerate and decelerate. I'm challenging myself with more speed bursts and longer runs and I've grown to love the burn in my calves early in each run. This burn tells me I can't go another step and somehow in the first half mile the muscles warm up and oxygenate and I'm in overdrive.

It will probably be brutally cold again tomorrow, so I'll be back,  Lord willing.

Never at a Convenient Time

The kitchen thermometer read minus 20 and the sign on the Uptown Cafe was swinging. By the arc of each swing I estimated 25 m.p.h. with gusts to thirty. The clanging wind chimes on our front porch underscored the warning. The wind chill was unthinkable. I had finished my outdoor work, walking the dogs, shoveling the snow and stoking the fire. I'd had my supper and reclined in my recliner. The house was at 73 degrees and I had my Kindle ready to sooth my tired bones with music.

The heavenly voices of Benedictine nuns singing chants, which is my kind of Christian music, wrapped my soul in comfort. For years I felt guilt over preferring this music over the kind of worship-team music prevalent in  churches, performed at a decibel level at the threshold of pain, all part of the current bombastic style of worship.

The sweet voices of the nuns carried me to the cusp of sleep when the doorbell rang and the dogs exploded into apoplectic  barks and howls warning us that Jack the Ripper was at the door. Lois answered the door, closing the inner door keeping the dogs at bay.

After a brief exchange Lois returned, "It's the next-door neighbors. Their car won't start and I told them that you'd come out and help them." I took my headphones off and sat up, thinking of how much work it takes to get bundled up, probably akin to the astronauts when they go outside of the International Space Station to do their repair work. Nonetheless I bundled up in snowmobile bibs, Sorel boots, military surplus parka and choppers.

My faithful F-150 truck rumbled to life and I let it run for a few minutes before heading around the block to the helpless Chevy Trailblazer. I opened the hood of my truck and then took out the sixteen foot jumper cables Lois had given me for Christmas. (There's a story behind that.) The Chevy had a side-terminal battery and I struggled to connect to the battery with my hands protected in choppers with double liners. The cold air made my arthritic knuckles burn. 

I nodded at Jeremy inside the car to try it. No heartbeat. The ground cable was connected to a part of the under-hood frame that was covered in plastic. A headlamp was strapped to my Kromer hat and I searched out a suitable metal ground. It started this time but died right away. I told Jeremy to step on the gas when it started and to turn off the radio and automatic headlights.

My hands were now cold inside my choppers and I went inside my truck to slightly rev the engine. I held my burning hands in front of the dash vents.Then I went out again and told Jeremy to try it, reminding him to step on the gas once the motor started. The motor came to life and roared as Jeremy stepped on the gas.

Jeremy and his significant other, Alice a black woman, heartily expressed thanks and I basked in the glow as I took off the cables. 

Jeremy has some disorder that makes his hands shake, Parkinsonian-style. In October he asked me if I would do their snow-removal this winter and I agreed. Jeremy offered no remuneration and I don't want any. 

I took Alleve for my aching hands. Lois sat at her computer and didn't look up. I returned to my music and thanked God that the Chevy had started.

The Irony of Sunshine

It was mid-morning and I heard our gas furnace rumble to life. My smart phone told me it was 2 below and it felt like 19 below. Normally I kindle a fire in our wood-fired boiler to ease the gas pains but several sieges of the arctic vortex have left me with  maybe two cords of hard maple in reserve.  I'll save that for when the wind chill is minus forty or lower. It is fortunate that it doesn't take much wood to heat the house but it adds up with each severe arctic vortex.

"Bah!" I said when I saw what Old Man Winter left overnight. In addition the city snowplow socked in my driveway and the entire length of sidewalk.

Lois and I sat down for toasted homemade bread and the deliciousness of the bread, topped with peanut butter and raspberry jam along with hot coffee comforted me for a while. I shut my mind against the inevitable task of snow removal. The beagle and the Scottish terrier each got a crust of bread. When Lois had taken the two out earlier the beagle did her duty and bolted for the front door, dragging Lois behind. The terrier was adventurous, cavorting in the deep snow, oblivious to the cold.

The two cups of coffee, along with earlier coffee necessitated a bathroom break and that's when I steeled myself for a long work session outdoors.

"I s'pose I ain't gonna get nothing done if I stay inside," I sighed. I pulled on my ski bibs and another layer of socks, my heavy "Michigan" hoodie, Sorel boots and topped it off with my Kromer cap. Then came the Air Force snorkel parka and choppers with double liners. Dressing was already a day's work and the clock sneaked up to 11:00. How does time sneak past me like that? (Lois says that I fart around too much, a sign of aging.)

The gust from the northwest almost tore the storm door out of my hand. I braced against the wind, snorkeled and buttoned down and reached for my trusty steel snow shovel, with wooden handle and cleared the front porch steps and the rear porch steps. My snow blower, a brand-new Ariens was in repose near the rear steps, the engine covered with a plastic tub.

I plugged in the electric starter and primed the engine three times, set the choke and pressed the starter button. Didn't start. (Ariens recommends priming the Polar Force engine only twice, so I didn't know if I had flooded the engine or if it wanted yet another push on the primer button.) I went for broke then punched the starter button and it started. Praise the Lord! Four primes did it!

I cleared the neighbor's front walk and their path through the backyard to their garage, then their garage and our garage. I didn't even feel cold. Must be those electric warming handle grips on the Ariens. Next came the place where I park my truck.

I have parked my truck in the yard, close to the house since vandals broke both side mirrors to the tune of $1117.16 about a week before Christmas. Last September they keyed the truck from front to back and that cost $800.00. Thank God our insurance covered both instances. Six other cars in the neighborhood suffered similar vandalism. My friend, Dale had the human male phallus carved into his hood and his insurance doesn't cover that.

I cleared out my truck's parking space and the sidewalk and realized that I had spent three hours in 20 below wind chill but I wasn't chilled because I clothe myself with the real deal, Air Force parka, etc., with no concern as to fashion or coolness. I saw three young girls, fashionably attired, running, stiff as sticks from their car to the Uptown Cafe. There is probably a spiritual lesson in this somewhere.

I parked the Ariens, gassed it up for the next time and told it, "good job" as I replaced it's plastic tub.

Now it was time to try my Ford F-150. We are to walk by faith, but I was thinking of what I would do if it didn't start. It started but protested, emitting a sound like "bawl". I'd bawl too if I sat in the sub-zero wind for fifteen hours.

Late this afternoon I sat down to my keyboard to write and  I noticed sunshine for the first time today. It was wan, but cheery and I gazed at the white landscape in the dusk. I looked out the other window and saw plenty of blue sky, actually a bad omen. A brief consultation with my smart phone confirmed this with a forecast for minus 20 tonight- thus the irony of sunshine. Yet it was a good day because I'm still physically able to do hard work.

Stranded Motorist

The Stranded Motorist

 It was snowing and it was difficult to see while driving. Nonetheless I had to do my errands; to dump the cardboard piled in the back of my truck. I went to the recycling bins behind the police station and dumped the cardboard I collected from the hotel where I work. I continued my errands at K-Mart. The road was treacherous, slippery at stop signs and traffic signals. It was cold, around zero, but felt much colder with the wind.

   There were a lot of customers at K-Mart. There is always a spike in shopping activity during foul winter weather. I located the whole wheat Ritz Crackers and the isopropyl alcohol for the car and the truck then stopped at the pharmacy for one of my prescriptions. It was too warm in the store and I was dressed in layers since I spend a lot of time outdoors. I hurried to get my business done.

   It was snowing intensely now, obliterating footprints made a short while ago. I started the truck and set about clearing and scraping the windshield, thinking this is another reason I hate winter. A tune by Borodin bounced around in my head and I marveled that Aleksander Borodin was really a chemist before he became a composer.

I was jolted from my reverie by a man asking me if I have jumper cables.

“I don’t know- maybe the battery is no good. My car is over there, see?”

“I’ll gladly help you once I get my windshield clear.”

The man opened the hood of the Chevrolet.

“I can’t even find the battery,” he said.

   I had accessed the battery in such a Chevy last summer for a damsel in distress so I knew where it was. Why GM hides the battery underneath the windshield washer reservoir and surrounded by hoses and unknown devices beats the heck out of me. It was  difficult to attach the jumper cables. My arthritic hands ached in stinging fashion from the cold and the wind.

We tried several times to get it going. I peered into the space with my flashlight. I couldn’t really tell if the cables were connected solidly. It was a side-terminal battery with tiny posts. The dopes who engineered this mess should have to do this in cold weather.

I had him try his headlights and they came on brightly.

“I don’t know. The battery isn’t the trouble.” I had accepted that the car wasn’t going to start.

   “Yeah, I had trouble a couple of weeks ago. Called Greg’s Towing and he looked around under the hood then he turned the key and it started. I had the car in Greg’s shop and he couldn’t find anything wrong. I guess I’ll call a cab from a pay phone.”

   “I can give you a ride. Do you want to call a wrecker from my cell phone?”

   “Naw, that’s okay. I’ll call later from home.”

   “I live outside of Hurley so it’s kind of far and the weather is so bad.”

   “Hop up into my truck. It’s nice and warm inside.” I noticed that he wasn’t wearing gloves and he was rubbing his hands together. He was about sixty years old, too old to be out in the cold for so long.

   “Thanks for going out of your way for me. You got to drive through Hurley and my house is on the Carey stretch.”

   “Not a problem.” The problem was my stinging hands as I gripped the wheel.

   “I’m George.”

   “I’m John. Pleased to meet you.”

   “Likewise.”

He held out a ten-dollar bill.

"Naw, I can't take your money. Tell you what, just pass it on. help someone when they're in a bind."

John held out his hand. "Merry Christmas, George."

"Likewise."

A Christmas Walk

The sun's failing light, filtered through earth's heavens,
Now amber, bouncing through the ermine-clad woods,
Entreats me to pause and watch as I stand on snowshoes.
 It's a loud quiet, drowning out life's cares.

Tree limbs, stressed with snowy burdens,
Arch and form a walk-way trellis over the miner's path.
I duck as I pass, careful not to disturb His artistry.
I've seen this wonder many times but yet it's new.

I am praying but without words, transfixed
At the splendor of the moment- fleeting,
This day  will die, a victim of the night.
But sublime is this little slice of time.