The Same Old... Same Old

Perhaps every generation has their great, uncontrollable nemesis. These nemisi could be shared father to daughter or mother to son or the problem could persist in similar spirits from generation to generation. Not necessarily on a global scale though many admirable articles have been penned with an argument as such.

On days, such as today, I leave my friends house full of bravado and bluster filled with the feeling that my freshly configured computer and I are capable of taking on the world. A few quick keystrokes here an alt-tab there and the world will soon be kneeling before Zod (or at the very least I will be capable of using my email).

However, when I arrive home and call my computer to life I am remiss if I do not remember my Grandfather and the motorboat. Grandpa, with glorious production, wheeling her out of the garage; the sparkling blue decals rippling on her sides, the ebony motor mounted on her back, prone, like a raging bull. Grandpa would always start it up in the driveway and after a few hard cranks of gasoline and oil, in short gray farts, the engine would kick to life.

The engine, as it was, would never start in the water. I’ve been assured by countless mechanics, since my Grandfather’s passing, that motorboat’s engines do not have acute fears of water, nor do their creators or assemblers have ironical senses of humor that they are capable of instilling within the machine.

It is probable that the disappointed looks on my friend’s faces mimic mine as a child when the motorboat wouldn’t start; it was never so much disappointment as fear for the Evinrude. This loveable engine that caused Grandpa so much grief yet would give the family so much to laugh about. Surely the pain it sacrificed behind closed garage doors was justifiable to the comedic gold it gave my dysfunctional family.

Man v. Machine, or more accurately Man v. Self, is a battle as old as the wheel. As, perhaps, are the friends and family that find the joy in laughing at those that attempt to tangle with technology. For now, if everybody would be kind enough to refrain from sending me email and rather mail letters direct to my post it will cease and desist me from smashing computers.