The talkative teenager
The Kid mistakes my compliment on his work spreading hay around the barn as an affirmation of my interest in chatting and consequently an invitation for him to talk … a lot. Never, ever, I remind myself, underestimate the loquacity of a teenage boy. He stops working while relating another story, so I finally cut him off in mid-flow: “If you must talk, then you must work at the same time.” He complies. And that slows him down. But just a bit.
Sweet Gum in the snow
The one-handed boy
Always with just the right hand, the Kid reaches out to do a task, leaving his left hand waving around on its own, independent course. “Help me hook up the bush hog.” He stoops, reaches with his right and tries to shift a tractor link. I suggest using both hands, and for a moment he embraces the two-fisted approach. Within a minute, though, he’s back to the one-handed action. I’m flummoxed. Is he practicing for the eventuality of a late-in-life stroke? A career at the Las Vegas slots? Has he made a Lentian resolution to put himself in the shoes of the one-armed man?
The next day he’s once again forking soiled barn bedding into a wheelbarrow singlehanded. I try once more. “Kid, use both of your hands on that pitchfork. You’ll find it a heck of a lot easier.” He does and it is. Yet after only a few minutes he reverts to the right-only approach.
The cause and the impossible solution to this worker’s handicap finally dawns on me that afternoon as I watch the Kid collecting eggs. There are only so many eggs you can pick up while holding them all in the same hand, and I’m really curious how it will resolve. I watch from the doorway of the coop. He gets creative (he’s certainly not lacking in intelligence in solving the challenge, albeit in a roundabout fashion) and snags a nearby bucket, tucking the handle into the crook of his left arm. This allows the heretofore torpid left hand to semi-reengage with life as the right goes on collecting eggs.
That’s when the proverbial light bulb finally comes on and I point out the obvious: “Kid, if you would stop carrying your phone around day and night, you might just remember God gave you two hands.” He stares at me blankly for a moment. Then a comprehending smile spreads across his face. The man is making a joke, so he laughs.
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Reading this weekend: Born in a Bookshop (V. Starrett). This autobiography of the famous author and bibliophile has surprised me in all the best ways. While it is certainly an accounting of his reading and collecting in life, it is also the story of early 20th century journalism in Chicago. There are unexpected stories of his war reporting from Mexico, where he hangs out with Jack London and his wife, with whom he goes shopping while waiting on the fighting to happen (which it never does). He shares numerous accounts of breaking into gruesome murder scenes to take pictures. Starrett shares the recollection of fellow journalist Carl Sandburg’s routinely buying a mystery book, then tearing out the first thirty pages and tossing the rest, saying he only needed thirty pages to read while commuting home on the train). He recounts playing hooky in D.C. with a young FDR while they scouted rare books and drinking and writing stories with Ben Hecht (of “The Front Page” stage and movie fame) … and I’m only halfway through the book.
