ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, December 11, 1995 TAG: 9512110042
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Monty S. Leitch
SOURCE: MONTY S. LEITCH
THE FIRST real snow of the season, and the four-wheel-drive on the truck won't work. It wouldn't matter, except that we've been counting on it; resting in the security of preparedness. Never mind the winter weather - we have four-wheel-drive!
And then - pfffttt - there it goes.
I'm reminded of the Thanksgiving, several years back, when the electricity went off just as I was about to put the turkey in the oven.
And of the day I finally screwed my courage to the sticking place, sat down to write The Great American Novel, and found that in the night my old computer had died.
And of the first really beautiful day of summer, when the grass was lush and ready at last to be mown, but the battery on the mower was dead.
I'm reminded of typewriter ribbons that give out at 4 a.m., in the middle of the next-to-the-last page of that paper you've pulled an all-nighter to write; of sewing machine lights that blink off just as you start the final buttonhole; of cars that run out of gas near the end of the driveway, but on the uphill end, so that the car drifts back toward the house instead of forward toward the nearest filling station.
Of ribbon rolls with 2 inches less ribbon than you need to go around your package, of flour cannisters a quarter-cup shy of your recipe's requirements (a discovery made after you've already creamed the butter and sugar, and broken the eggs), of ink cartridges that last until you've written the ``Sin'' of ``sincerely'' and then peter out in a blur.
Happy holidays.
"A little neglect may breed mischief,'' Ben Franklin wrote, `` ... for want of a nail, the shoe was lost; for want of a shoe the horse was lost; and for want of a horse the rider was lost.''
Ben Franklin was big on preparedness. A stitch in time, and all that.
"A horse! A horse! My Kingdom for a horse!'' cried Shakespeare's Richard III.
Presumably he would have a taken a horse with or without shoes.
As would have I, when the four-wheel drive gave out.
Personally, I think mischief breeds itself. How else to explain the interruption of power on Thanksgiving? The light bulb, typewriter ribbon, ink cartridge or computer that lasts just long enough to let you see the project's end, but keeps you from accomplishment?
Gremlins, that's what it is. ``Small gnomes,'' Webster tells us, ``held to be responsible for the malfunction of equipment.''
They dance around with the sugar plums and elves this time of year, you know.
Don't believe me? Wait until you try to put up last year's strings of lights on this year's tree. You'll be missing three tiny bulbs, all of them yellow, only you won't discover this until K-Mart, Walmart, Revco, Lowe's and Kroger have each sold out of the size replacement bulbs you need.
Happy holidays.
"A day late and a dollar short,'' The Man of the House says. But he presumes personal accountability. (As did Ben Franklin.) It seems to me that sanity demands, instead, the presumption of gremlins.
It is they who press the free end of the scotch tape down tight against the roll. They who seal together both ends of the plastic garbage bags. They who tangle the Saran Wrap, stop ketchup tight in bottlenecks, steal socks from the washing machine. They who hide the windshield scrapers, umbrellas and matching gloves; they who put empty peanut-butter jars back into cabinets and empty milk cartons back in refrigerators.
Stitch all your stitches in time. Nail up all your shoes. Neglect nothing. Plan ahead. It will do no good. Gremlins are inevitable. You'll get within a half-inch of the bottom of that sweater you're knitting ... and run out of yarn. Happy Holidays!
LENGTH: Medium: 73 linesby CNB