(and here is what he wrote:)
What Dad Taught Me About Lending and Borrowing Tools
The loan of a tool is a sacred, holy thing, especially when it involves that kind of rare, extremely hard-to-replace, vintage implement that does the job oh-so-much-better than anything manufactured in the last half-century (and you know the type I'm talking about; they're always rust-colored without actually being rusty). Man, that's an expression of trust!
I was brought up by a second-generation, Italian-American Dad in a paper paint hat, shoulder-strap undershirt and leather tool-belt. Grandpa wore the same uniform. Both made their livings as disciplined craftsmen and both treated their tools like a priest treats golden altar utensils. When he gave me my first bicycle, Dad, in ceremonial solemnity, withdrew from his tool cabinet, a satchel-grip of ancient hand tools—and with laser beam eye-contact, gave me permission to use them as I needed, explicitly conditional on their diligent care and return. One made certain to be careful with the tools Grandpa had handed down to Dad. Respect.
Well, Dad has been gone for a number of years and his tools are mine, now (and they sure as hell don't go in the plastic bucket with my Harbor Freight junk). Some of them have the Ford imprint, for Giuseppe and Conrad were Ford men; and when I reach for one of those wrenches to use on my Model T—
which is identical to the car in the sepia-tone photo of Dad and Uncle Lou, for they two went partners on a 1915 Touring just before the war—I get a feeling of heart-tugging nostalgia. I gaze at that tool in my hand and from the archives of my memory, a video is selected much the same way an old Wurlitzer juke box would extract a single record from a horizontal stack of 45’s. As it plays, there’s Dad looking not quite forty years old, and he smiles patiently as he tells Bobby, not yet Bob, "Before you screw on the nut, turn it backwards till you feel the click; THEN spin it on."
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