No Need for a Curly

Yesterday, I spent eight hours at my job, and two hours at my mechanic's job.

I joked with my wife, after I'd finally arrived home, that "my day was great until I left work." And, for someone who works at an inpatient psychiatric hospital, that's saying something.

Actually, spending two hours with your sixty-eight-year old Israeli mechanic and his indeterminately-aged though much younger Chinese assistant isn't a half bad way to decompress after spending a full working day among 70 psych patients and some similarly-afflicted staff members. At least, at the garage, you've got the bay doors open and the sunlight is streaming in, and you're surrounded by cars, in various states of disrepair. Cars and mechanics-- simpler both than your average psych patient.

Soly and Jack have been working together since "1996 or '97, I can't remember," said Jack when I asked him yesterday. Soly, the sunburnt sabra, screams and curses. Jack, the obedient Chinese assistant, dutifully and quietly takes abuse. Soly is very much like hot-tempered Moe, and Jack is definitely Larry-- hapless, in the way, liable to get his hair pulled and his face smacked.

The only thing missing in that garage is a Curly, but I don't see any twinkle-toed, obese, balding men with high-pitched voices and a propensity for playing the spoons entering the picture anytime soon. Though I don't think it would surprise me if one did.

I went to see Jack and Soly yesterday because, on Tuesday, they changed my tires and noticed that I needed new front brakes and rotors.

"Why?" I asked.

"WHY?!" Soly screamed into the phone, "because the FAH-KEENG ESS-HOLE who owned your car before you put brakes on WITHOUT CHANGING THE ROTORS! Volvo, BMW, and Mercedes, if you change the brakes, you HAVE TO CHANGE THE ROTORS!"

And now I know that. And so do you. The person who owned my car before me obviously didn't know that, and now she was being maligned by some short, angry Israeli in a dirty work shirt and shorts that she'd never met.

This is what life is.

And so, yesterday, I went to Soly and Jack's to have my brakes (AND ROTORS) put on. But they didn't fit.

So they ordered another set to be delivered to the shop. They arrived forty-five minutes later, during which time I watched Soly fight with two customers and turn someone away who wanted to buy scrap metal from him for $0.15 a pound.

"What am I, a fah-keeng retarded?" he asked me, rhetorically, I presumed.

The second set of rotors didn't fit either.

"Oh my God, wat dee fak! JACK! Call Jeff and tell him to get me rotors here now. GODDAMNIT!"

I stared at my car, up on the lift, with the two front tires off. I wasn't going anywhere fast, so I sat down on a rickety wooden chair and enjoyed the atmosphere and the conversation. Mrs. Apron had been there earlier that morning to get her oil changed and her car inspected and to get new wiper blades on.

"So," Jack said to me as he was yanking a 16-inch tire off the rim of a 2009 Ford Econoline van that had just failed its emissions inspection, "you gonna have twins-- you the big daddy. No more money."

"That's right, Jack," I said, smiling, "so enjoy swiping my debit card today-- if you guys ever get the right fucking rotors here."

He laughed.

Other people might have been indignant about spending two hours in a garage, especially after they'd just worked a full day, but I wasn't. Because we could talk, about having twins, about mortgage rates, about what it's going to be like for my father if my wife and I have at least one boy.

"Let me tell you," Soly said, "for Iraqi Jews, if you have a son-- forget about it. That is eeet! He going to have your father around his finger, for good."

"I sure didn't have him wrapped around my finger-- my sister was always the favorite."

"But you are good," Jack said, furrowing his brow, "you always do the right thing, you grown up."

"Jack, shut up!" Soly yelled, "dat's not what eet is about! The sister is like the father, so he look like he like her more. But he is good. You are good. I didn't go to school for a fucking psychology, I can talk to you for five minutes and I know that you are good. And your father would facken' kill himself to make you happy."

It's funny, discussing the dynamics of your family with your car mechanics, but we've known Soly and Jack fifteen (maybe fourteen) years. I took my first car for its first oil change there. The barber who gave me my first haircut. The doctor who gave me my first shot. These connections mean something to me, and I cannot let them go.

And, even after two hours and three sets of rotors, I don't much want to.

P.T. Loser

This is a picture of a broken tie-rod that Soly & Jack, the Israeli and Chinese mechanics with whom I trust my car and my life, removed from my 2001 PT Cruiser yesterday morning. Jack realized I needed a new tie-rod when he was in the process of putting two brand-new tires on the car, replacing two old, bald ones. When he put the new tire on the front passenger side and tightened the lugs, he put his hand on the tire and it wobbled around like a wagon wheel from Oregon Trail.

"Oh, shit," Jack said.

"Please don't say that," I said, knowing I was already looking at around a $200 service bill for the oil change and the two tires.

But it was definitely an "Oh, shit," and my total for the day ended up being $395.38.

As Click & Clack would say, "Looks like Soly's going to make this month's boat payment."

Frankly, I have difficulty picturing 61-year-old grizzled and gnarled Soly piloting a boat. At least, not any boat that doesn't have an Israeli flag on its side and an anti-aircraft gun on the stern.

I know, also, that Soly and Jack don't tell me something's wrong when it isn't. When they removed the bum tie-rod, they showed it to me. "You needed a new one of those more than you needed two new fucking tires," said Soly, "if that snapped, and it was close to snapping, you'd be dead."

I was going to ask him to take the tires back then, but they were already on the car.

Going to Soly & Jack's always fills me with a mixture of emotions. On the one hand, I really enjoy being there. I like the way their garage smells, I like the sound the heater makes when it turns itself on, I like Soly & Jack's uniforms-- and not in that annoying hipster way, either-- and, of course, I just like Soly & Jack. I like talking to them about Sarah Palin (Soly: "She would have made a good prostitute.") and I like talking to them about where they came from (Jack: "I came here from China in 1991, January 1st. My sister and I slept for 24 hours our first day here. Heard fireworks. I was so fucking bored for two years.")

What I don't like is giving them lots of money. This tends to happen, though, when I bring around the PT Cruiser. Bushings, ball-joints, broken rims, haywire electrical system, a sunroof that closes sometimes, oxygen sensors, tie-rods, dog-bones (yes, apparently there's a rear component of my car's suspension called a "dog bone." It's got three holes. Jack showed it to me.) All things break. I understand that. When they break, you need to fix them. I just wish things wouldn't break so often and that, when they did, they were cheaper to replace.

For a car built on the cheap, it's not very cheap to fix.

"This thing is a fucking joke!" Soly yelled at me today, in between sips of his coffee, which he drinks from a miraculously pristine white ceramic mug, "It gets, what, 20 miles-a-gallon, barely, it accelerates like a fucking old dog, and it looks like a cow that's bending over!" He energetically gulps some more coffee and then he rages, his forsaken, broken teeth jutting out like icicles, "That's why they only made this piece of shit for one year!"

I stared at him. I was shocked. I thought Soly knew everything about cars.

"Soly, they're still making them today."

"WHAT?!" he bellowed furiously at me, spitting coffee onto my cardigan, "Then how come every goddamn customer I have who drives one of these things drives a 2001?!"

Using my internet-ready smartphone, I Googled "PT Cruiser" and showed him that Chrysler began production in 2000 and it's scheduled to continue until 2010.

"What is that," asked Soly, peering at my phone under his bifocals, "a Blueberry?"

"Yeah," I said, "with cream on top."

"What probably happened was," Soly reasoned, "they sold the PT Cruisers everywhere in 2001, and, when smart people realized they were pieces of shit, they sold the rest of them down South, where the retards live." In spite of his insinuation that I am equivalent to a Kentucky-fried, sister-fucking retard, I laughed.

When Jack tells me that the tie-rods are "always going bad on these cars," I complain that this is what he says whenever I bring the car in for something.

"What doesn't 'always go bad on these cars'?" I asked. Jack smiled at me.

"The seats."

Soly refers to my car as the "P.T. Loser."

I told him that my wife really loves the car and has a great desire to only have one car payment, which I respect and understand. The Cruiser is paid off and is titled under my name. She has a 2009 Honda Fit which she loves more than Jesus loves his Birkenstocks.

"My wife loves this car and she thinks it's indestructable," I told Soly, "her mother has one that has over 200,000 miles on it."

"Well, she's crazy-- she's probably had every fucking thing rebuilt on it besides the radio antenna! It's not even the same car it was in 2001 anymore."

I told him that I wanted to sell it and get a 1968 Beetle. He laughed.

"See? You're fucking crazy, too! You are perfect for each other."

We both cracked up at that. In the midst of our laughter, Jack came up and informed me that the motor mounts were starting to go. He motioned for me to come over so I could see for myself.

"No," I said. "I believe you."