Learning New Things

I don’t think I can claim that I learn “something new” very often.

Usually (or so it seems), any given day or event falls simply into the category of confirming what I already knew. A repeat performance. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. There’s a lot of power in repetition. If it was sport or playing guitar, it would be considered practice. And that is certainly positive.

Yesterday though, I added a new knowledge. Loosely speaking, it was the technique of “panel-beating” (specifically, it was straightening a bent metal tube from my professional-grade Millar tripod). My Dad (who BTW is 96), is a “mechanical-advantage genius”. Yesterday he taught me… (again)… that most things are possible if you only know how.

He is a genuine Mr Fix It.

Again?... Dad has been repeating this to me since I was a kid. “If you have the right tool, most things are possible, if you only know how.”

Dad doesn’t always have the right tool. Enter the concept “improvisation”. Or to use that expression “improvisation is the mother of all invention”.

And if improvising, with the handle of a screw-driver, a triangular wedge, a hacksaw blade, a rasped washer, a cut-off piece of water pipe and some looped wire doesn’t work? Dad makes a tool that does. (I did say that he was a “mechanical-advantage genius” didn’t I?)

Working with my Mr Fix It Dad isn’t easy… (that’s a Father-Son thing), but… (without going into the Father-Son Thing that says I will forever remain 14 years old in his estimation of my abilities, especially highlighted by my Mum coming up to us working together with a bemused expression to ask, “Are you two still talking to each other?”)… I have to recognize that over the years, I have benefitted by learning how to use all manner of tools, and have learned the lesson of seeing a problem as fixable.

With my status of being the eternally youthful 14yo apprentice accepted, (all sons and daughters may nod their heads in agreement in that regard), the ability of hammering or using a screwdriver in either left or right hand is one such bonus. It’s brilliant to know that I can take a leaking tap/faucet and fix it.

In response to countless times I have been asked why my Dad and I tackle a job ourselves (even at age 96), rather than calling in the appropriate plumber/carpenter/builder/etc? The answer: I have been trying to change/influence my father for years…

In conclusion: Dad told me this story about a genius panel-beater that he knew. It was during WW2 and a front fender/wing for a Rolls Royce needed to be repaired. Spare parts during WW2 didn’t exist, so the genius panel beater took a raw piece of flat sheet metal and with nothing more than a hammer and anvil, created a perfectly shaped replacement part!