In Time (revised)

There was a time 

...when I needed to name the moments
   so each could be filed in a memory
   that is too worn and weary to recall without cues--

...when my throat, inflamed and rough,
   couldn't hold my voice;
   when doubt strangled my thoughts before words formed--

       --Because minutes don't pause to be mourned

I keep postcards from the past in a worn leather briefcase.
They were ribboned and packed only after
I did my business with time.

Now, names I assigned to the moments then,
fall into my head
as dead as the browned autumn leaves.
And as easy to ignore,

         --in time.

~MNH

A Woman and her Tools

When I was 17 (that's not a typo), my husband taught me to change a tire. Necessity is the mother of invention, but Poverty is the Saint of  Do-it-Yourselfers. Poverty not only meant that we scavenged our tires from a recycling heap, but "changing a tire" meant we literally changed our tires: we took the exploded tire off the rim and put the new-to-us one on the  rims. In retrospect, this may be why we had so many exploded tires (you think?). I learned the difference between  wrench and pliers in those years, and we learned together how to change the car's struts without killing ourselves. Trust me on this kids: don't try that one at home.

We bought our tools and automobile parts from Pick-a-Part (although I don't even want to think about why people are junking cars with shovels and axes in the trunks). Years later, my uncle stopped by the family home to collect some of my grandpa's stuff and accidentally left with most of Ron's tools. I felt like I had betrayed us by letting it happen. Although I eventually boxed up and gave away his things after he died, I kept the tools that were left. The greasy hand prints were his, and attached to nearly every tool was a memory of working on a car together. Plus, I used them sort of regularly.

When I remarried, my new husband didn't understand  why  I was crushed when the marital-merging of tools made me feel like they were his tools. He used them more often and they went into his toolbox, which sometimes had a lock on it. I felt like I had to ask to use them, and  I lost a bit of independence when I couldn't leave my screwdriver in the kitchen drawer without irritating him when it didn't make it back in his box. Ron's beat-up old toolbox, scavenged from a well-used Chevy's truck bed, got thrown out along the way in favor of something newer. When I found out, I was unexpectedly taken by the feeling that something familiar and comforting had been lost. More than a decade later, it shocked me that the only physical belongings I was willing to fight for in the divorce were the tools I came into the marriage with. He could have the car, TV, bed, dressers, and house--everything but the tools.

My brother came to visit shortly after the divorce proceedings started. He's an insightful person: he brought me some of his spare tools and organized mine.  I was thrilled to have a collection started again, but after loaning them out and having  people 'borrow' them without telling me, I feel again like I have to ask to use my own tools and it's time to make a stand.  Often, I first have to make the uncomfortable call to ask if he (that's gender neutral 'he', of course) has the tool before I can ask for it to be returned. And just as often, whether the tool is sitting in my shed or he borrowed it without asking, the response is righteous indignation at the question and if he has it, at  my request for its return.

I'm considering getting a set of pink tools. Call me crazy, but I think they'd be borrowed less often. And if you're ever at the junk yard and see a woman peeking in the back of every  Chevy on the lot, it's me--looking for a weathered pink toolbox.

Yes, they make them!
Apollo Precision Tools DT9706P 39-piece Pink General Tool Set
Apollo Precision Tools DT0773N1 135-Piece Household Pink Tool Kit

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