Dad’s gotten on one of his hobby trains again, and this time it’s DIY motor mechanics. Don’t get me wrong – I’m 100% in favour of dad having something meaty to do, now that he’s retired early to a life of leisure. It’s just that he has a habit of investing deeply in a particular activity and then discarding it six months later. I kind of want him to pick one thing and stick with it.
Mum says he’s just trying to find his niche and that we should let him be. But she isn’t saddled with finding the man a fathers’ day gift. You never know if it’s going to be a pruning saw, an anchor winch or a telescope that’ll float his boat at any given moment. In light of that, I’m declining to get him the car jack he’s been eyeing off, even though it’s on special. By the time an occasion arises to gift it to him, he’s bound to be over it.
He’s started tinkering with his mate’s truck, and seems to fancy himself as a diesel mechanic. Hobart already has plenty of those per capita, surely, but what’s that to a man left to tinker with a truck to his heart’s content? I can’t deny that it’s nice to see him enjoying something so much – possibly even more than he enjoyed that online astronomy course.
I have to admit, it would be nice to have some around to do the odd auto mechanical fix, or at least give an educated guess on what the problem is. I mean, I’m pretty sure I could have paid less last month for that transmission repair. Hobart mechanics probably have more integrity than I’m giving them credit for, but still. It’d be nice to have a second opinion on things like that.
Maybe mum’s right, and he’s just on a mission to find his ‘thing’. Dad’s always been a real stickler for thoroughness in any given undertaking, so it makes sense that he’s going deep on his apparent mission to find his niche.