Sixties Chick

There has been much said recently among the people I know about memory. Or rather the loss of it. It was the topic of conversation at an otherwise very upbeat Christmas party just last week. My friend Ken recounted that recently he had gone up the stairs of his house three times and had forgotten each time what he had gone up for. Aside from the exercise it afforded him, he found it worrisome. Ken’s a pretty rational, level headed New Englander, not given to speculation, but he believes that Teflon is the culprit. I had never heard that one before, but as a writer, I like the idea. It is poetic.

Another friend whose name escapes me at the moment, stated that she now begins every story with the warning “Stop me if I’ve already told you this.” When it was my turn, I skipped the more commonplace incidents like “boiling the pot along with the eggs” or “forgetting the dog outside on the porch.” Instead, I shared that on my way to Wegmans a few weeks before, three quarters of the way there while stopped at a red light on Main Street, I was suddenly unable to remember where I was going. Was it the bank, the liquor store, the post office? I ran through the list of possibilities. Unlike Ken, I see the years of filling rolling papers and bongs as the probable cause. But that’s another story.

Thankfully I recovered before the light changed and realized that I was headed for the supermarket and, most probably and very shortly, for dementia as well. I had the thought, however, that if indeed dementia was to be my destiny, it might not be all that bad. At least, I wouldn’t know I had it. Aside from the notion of ignorance as bliss, there might be other benefits as well.

One such benefit, I figure,  is an ongoing clean slate. The chance to begin again…and again. And again. Who doesn’t love that? And this brings me to the New Year. As I create my list for 2009 of those things I’d like to be and do in the New Year, I think back to this very same time last year. What, I wonder, did I commit to for 2008? What did I aspire to just one year ago?

Not surprising, I can’t remember this either. I suppose there was the usual – “eat better,” “exercise more,” “meditate daily” and “finish the book.” With a somewhat vague assessment of goals I’ve forgotten, I guess I did ok. Surely, I could have done better.  Aren’t I still working on the book? No matter, tabula rasa means possibility abounds. Reason to hope. This year, with the blessing of being able to start anew once again, here are my resolutions. For 2009, I’d like to remember to be kind rather than right. To stay out of fear. To quiet down and go inside for the answers. To dance often. And lest I forget, to finish the damn book.

And yours?

My friend Richard swears to me that he can fix the toilet. “Piece of cake,” he proclaims. “Done it many times.” He tells me he knows just what I need and doesn’t even have to come over and look. He’ll go and pick up the part. “Not to worry,” he assures me, “this item will definitely do the trick.”

I am a bit suspect. Not that I don’t want to believe him. I do. I know that fixing a toilet can be relatively easy and calling a plumber – very expensive, so I am relieved to hear Richard’s confident tone. Money is tight; I am grateful for his willingness. It’s just that I can’t believe he really knows how to fix toilets. I can not believe a Jewish guy could actually be handy.

No, this is not an anti-Semitic slur. I am a Jew myself, and in my experience, Jews do not know how to fix toilets, wire a house, put up drywall or lay tile. Now I know there must be some exceptions of course. Jesus for one, a particularly prominent Jew, was after all a master carpenter who made miracles with his able hands. But in my life, I have never met a Jew who could change a fuse let alone fix anything at all around the house. Until Richard, or so he says.

Richard is not a handyman by trade. He makes his living as an attorney. An employee rights attorney and a good one. But on the couple of occasions he has offered to help me with household handyman issues, he arrives at the door with his red metal tool chest, very eager to help and very sure of himself. He says he loves these kinds of projects. Been doing them for years. His skill, he says, dates back to his years as a machinist on the factory floor, after graduating Swarthmore when he set out to organize workers. He says this kind of work is great compared to writing briefs all day long. He is a born troubleshooter.

The last job he did for me, though, as Richard the Jewish electrician rather than Richard the Jewish plumber, is still giving him pause. He says that even now he’s trying to figure out why the new switch he installed did not work to produce light from the overhead fixture on the porch. He will never give up nor will he ever admit that perhaps the porch light conundrum surpasses his level of electrical expertise. It doesn’t matter. I put candles out there instead. You’ve got to love him for trying.

This time, crouching on the bathroom floor squeezed between the wall and the toilet replacing a cruddy, worn out water fill with a beautiful one piece model, it looked as if Richard the Jewish plumber would be victorious. He read the detailed instructions; I reread them back to him. He pulled here, unscrewed there. He loosened. He tightened. He turned the widget one eighth of an inch counter clockwise holding from the bottom as instructed, and when the cap refused to lift after several attempts, Richard announced that this particular step was not important. It could be skipped. Overlooked and on to the next. Finally, after the thin black hose was cut and secured to the angled clip, pulled just so to avoid crimping, both Richard and I rejoiced in the sweet silence of a dripless tank.

The next morning a little pool of water had formed by the base of the toilet. With great hesitancy, I called Richard before he went off to the office. “Houston, I think we’ve got a problem,” I said trying to make light of defeat. There seems to be a slight leak. I hated to have to break it to him. Feared for what lay ahead.

“I’ll be right over,” he said, “even though the guarantee has expired.” (Clearly, Jewish plumbers are comedians too.) And he came. At 7:30am, dressed in his plaid flannel shirt, he headed upstairs to assess the problem, eager to solve yet another mystery. Draping himself around the girth of the bowl, head down, he discovered a loose bolt between the tank and the bowl, its threads worn smooth. He tightened it and thought that it might be ok, but he wanted me to know that he was up to the task if it required more. As he spelled out several possible scenarios that might in fact be necessary, it seemed as if he were hoping it would require more. “I’ve replaced many a toilet, you know,” he reassured me. “There’s really nothing to it.” I look at him with dismay, picturing the possibility, yet wanting desperately to believe – that if you’re a Jewish plumber, you can pretty much walk on water.