Farmboy Engineering

Last winter, the handle had somehow broken off the dipstick of my son’s car.  We took it to Jack, who does all our repair work and asked about the cost.  He quoted us $65.00 plus a new dipstick.  This seemed fair, but was more than I wanted to pay. I can be very frugal (read: cheap) sometimes and suggested to Andrew that we could extract the old dipstick ourselves and save some money.  He looked at me as though my third eye was showing.  To make a long story short, we took his car to the Toybox, I drilled a small hole in the top of the remaining piece of the dipstick, and by threading a small screw into it, extracted the old dipstick.  After spending $17.00 for a new one, the problem was solved.

My son was amazed. He asked me where I had learned that trick and I had to think about it very carefully.  I didn’t have a clear answer.  I hadn’t taken a class, nor had I read an article about how to remove a broken dipstick.  What it came down to was that I watched people accomplish things and learned from them.  Working with my grandfather signaled the beginning of this training.  He taught me early on that if you stopped and thought about what you needed to do, there was always a way to get it done.  When we were building a barn and needed to stand vertical beams up that were way too heavy to handle, he figured out that with a rope and a horse, you could walk those timbers up to a standing position.  He also taught me (in a time when vehicles were much simpler) how to shut the engine off going downhill if you were short of gasoline and needed to get home. 

Following his training, I had the opportunity to work with a yard foreman in a Payless store. I honestly believe he could have moved anything with just a couple of rubber bands and a paperclip.  He had a lot of common sense.  He would sit back, look at a problem and then come up with an ingenious solution.  He was not a brilliant man, but he knew how to get things done.  My father in law was also that type of person. He would come up with ways to handle problems others would never consider.  For example, in his shop there was a small square hole cut in the wall. If the electricity failed, he could reach through the hole and pull the rope that released the garage door opener.  He was also the first person I knew to have a quick disconnect on his gas grill on the outside of the house.

I learned plenty from these folks and others about slowing down and thinking through a problem.  I guess it is my turn to move that on to new generations, namely my son and maybe someday, his son.  I heard a speaker say in the last few weeks that when you reach the age of 65, you automatically get wisdom.  I look forward to that day. I will enjoy feeling that I have at least gained some wisdom, and since my son will be over the age of thirty by then, I am sure I will have become much smarter than I was when he was sixteen.  Great things come with age.

I encourage you to look around for people in your life who make things happen, maybe even in ways you do not understand.  It may be the janitor at work who keeps things cleaner than you expect, or the person that serves you the most amazing hamburger at lunch.  It could be a friend, a spouse, or anyone.  Watch them, slow down and think about easier, smarter ways to do things.  This is the heart of farm boy engineering.  Relax, take some time, and figure out an easier and smarter way.