I hid behind the car, heart pumping as Papa Doon's keys skittered past me. If those babies had collided with my head, I'd have been knocked unconscious. I was supposed to be screwing in the shelf brackets when my little brother had started tickling me. I turned and kicked him in the shin, and he responded by punching me in the kidney. I chased him and threw him on the ground, beating him about as badly as a nine year old can a six year old without drawing blood, when Papa Doon saw us. He cursed and brogued that we were s'bosed ta be bleckin' workin' instead of gallavantin' around'. We dispersed and here, dear reader, you entered upon the scene as we forgot our simple pains and ran behind the car as to avoid much severer ones.
Papa Doon was a good grampa, just of the old school. He had been apprenticed as a carpenter and knew everything about houseware and construction equipment. He had helped us fix up our apartment, and eventually our home too, although he was in his early 80s. His shop in the basement, which smelled of oil and wood shavings, was always dank, and during the summer, wonderfully cool. Here he showed us how to saw and shave wood, how to hammer a nail, and how to manipulate all kinds of other construction equipment. He only reprimanded us when we were naughty, as in the above scene, which as you can see, was instigated by my little brother.
There was something simple about his home, from the way the lace curtains hung to the clothesline pulley he favored over the dryer in the dank basement. He didn't have cable television, and you had to change the channel with a pencil, since the buttons had long ago fallen off. The neighborhood was old Irish, a refuge for immigrant families during my mother's childhood, now deteriorated into younger, more desperate Irish immigrants come over from the motherland for summer work. And so when we were told we were staying with Papa Doon, we weren't exactly excited or thrilled, although we did enjoy the late afternoon Shirley Temples he bought us at his favorite watering holes.
So today when I remember Grampa's mastery over maintenance products, it is with tear-filled eyes that I wish I hadn't been so distracted by little Matthew, and had instead taken to heart the lessons he imparted about construction equipment.
Author Resource:-
BIC Supply offers outdoor products, door parts, shelf brackets and tire plugs among other construction equipment.
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