No, thank YOU

It was the most ordinary of days. I was pulling weeds, mainly to have something green to put on top of the newspaper laid on top of the week's compost. Weeds, compost, newspaper...it's all about layering.

Zelda came out to ask me some questions about her car. Jiffi-Lube had changed the oil but not topped-off all the fluids, as she had expected, and told her she needed a new battery, but she was skeptical. We took a look, and her Focus clearly needed coolant and transmission fluid. We had just enough of the latter in the garage to fill it to the 'full' line. She looked up 'coolant' in the owner's manual and asked me to go to Advance Auto with her.

Are you kidding? Of course I'll go.

We hop in her car and drive the mile down State Street while she tells me about seeing a former co-worker in the art department at Publishing Conglomerate Inc., Paul, who was at her bookstore, Cheap Books, to sell some books and mentioned his brother, Joe, who coached soccer with me when we lived in Grandview and our kids were little. Well, Joe now works at another Cheap Books store near Grandview, where Zelda was helping do inventory for a couple of days last week, so she talked to Joe (who says hi) and learned that his son Cole, who was a good friend of Jessi's in second grade, is now going to school at CCAD.

All this in like two minutes.

The service guy at Advance Auto was very helpful. Zelda ask him about coolant, and we quickly figured out that we didn't need Polykryptonite Zirkon-encrusted Special Coolant, we needed regular coolant.

Then we looked at batteries and compared the Silver 3-year warranty $75.00 battery and the Blue 2-year warranty $59.95 battery, but the service guy offered to test her battery for free. "It will take two minutes." He wheeled the machine out to the parking lot, right next to where Smackie's Barbecue was feeding the throngs of people in black tee-shirts out to ogle the customized motorcycles and classic cars on an August afternoon in Methodistville.

Turns out her battery is fine, so for the cost of a gallon of antifreeze Zelda was good to go. However, I got in my Ranger and went directly back to Advance Auto to have my battery tested. (A little back-story: it's been running a little rough, and once last week refused to start while parked in front of Ron Order of the Arrow's house. Ron had jumper cables, and his neighbor gave us a jump, but that gave me a warning.) Service guy's machine told me my battery was "bad" and wasn't holding enough of a charge; there was corrosion on the terminals, and it was probably overworking the alternator. You can use the same machine to test an alternator, but only if you have a good battery, so first things first. I bought a new battery - the cheaper one - and service guy installed it on the spot.

Was it my imagination, or was the Ranger running a little smoother after starting right up?

Zelda was amused that her car checkup led to my getting a new battery. She was also immpressed with the service guy for answering her questions directly, for treating her as the customer, and for addressing the appropriate information to her, not her old man. I allowed as how he had also treated me with respect, too, instead of patronizing me as some mechanics would.

She went out the back gate to her evening activities and called back to me, "Thanks for helping me today, Dad." You're welcome. Then a hawk flew through a gap in the trees about ten feet above my head and across the back yard to a pine tree.