Every week—really every day—I make a point of trying to learn something new. A new skill, a new fact, a new place, a new anything. Sometimes these learnings are driven by curiosity, and sometimes they are presented to me as an opportunity. Like this morning, when the rubber on one of my windshield wipers frayed and started squiggling around the windshield like one of those inflatable tube men you see dancing in front of your local Valvoline. Coincidentally, Valvoline replaces windshield wipers, but today I thought, it’s about time I learned how to replace it on my own.
Dad Mode
Plus, I’m in full dad mode these days, trying to figure out how to save money wherever I can. About once a week, the family can expect me to suddenly get up and start hunting around the house, looking for things to fix or upgrade. I live in fear of having to pay another person to come work on my house, so I try to head them off at the pass. With AI coming and my kids soon heading off to college, I think I’m having added concerns that in the future, nobody will know how to do anything anymore—so I better figure it all out so I can help show my family what to do.
I suppose this is common dad operating procedure. I need to learn, and I need to save moolah doing it! We’re not in coupon-saving mode yet, but I did sign up for a credit card this morning at Lowe’s that I didn’t need, because it saved me $100 on an air conditioner.
Auto Mechanic Am I
So rather than Valvoline, I headed to O’Reilly Auto Parts and asked for guidance from the lady behind the register. The stereotypical male need to pretend that I know what I’m doing has long passed through my system, and I have no problem walking into any room now and declaring to anyone, including a lady, “I need help.” I’m all about efficiency these days (the clock is ticking!), and I’ve got no time to waste on fraudulent behavior. She showed me my options, explained how the new wiper blades fit into a “hook” on the car’s wiper wire, and told me to come back to her if I had any trouble.
In the parking lot, I climbed up on the front tires of my truck to get a good look at what I was doing. Nervous I was going to shred some piece of the wiper base, I gently flicked the locking clip on the plastic casing and then slowly rocked the arm away from the base until I saw the “hook,” just as described. It was so easy, and I felt like an idiot for never knowing how to do this until now. Why have I never tried this before? It’s not like I’m not handy. Earlier this morning, I replaced a light switch in my kids’ bathroom and applied the last coat of lacquer on a table I’ve been refinishing. What made me wait so long to work on the car?
“Why have I never tried this before?“
Solving the Riddle
I think, like anything else, if nobody is around us to let us know how something works, we let it become shrouded in mystery—something beyond our capability. We start thinking it’s something only “experts” can do—even something as ridiculously easy as replacing a windshield wiper. Usually, I don’t run into such roadblocks in my thinking, but anything with an engine seems to make me pause. In the quiet hours of the night, I sometimes fantasize about having a buddy who is an auto mechanic who can show me how to work on my car.
There is YouTube, Matt. You’re right, there is YouTube. And O’Reilly. Everything becomes so easy to fix, or learn, if we just know who to ask for help.
And, given that auto repairs these days cost about as much as a family vacation to the Caribbean, the next time something fails on the truck, I’m now going to be more likely to try fixing it on my own at first. I’m not saying I’m ready to get under the car and start changing the oil in the driveway yet, but I could be. I could be.
It could happen…