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December 24, 2008

Men don't ask for directions.

"What are you doing?"

"Trying to fix the garage shutter."

"Look up yellow pages."

k rummages through pages and pages of old manuals to find our garage manual, "No, I think I can fix it. Give me a few minutes."

A few hours later, I find k sitting on top of our car squinting at the motor hanging from the ceiling of our garage.

"Are you coming to dinner?"

"Give me a few, I am trying to figure this out..."

An hour later k eats dinner in silence poring over the hefty manual.

I give him a gentle reminder, "You know you can have someone fix this for you, it's not worth your time."

"I can get the part for it. I think I know what the problem is. If I get the guy to fix it, he's going to charge $170 unnecessarily."

It's midnight and I still hearing sounds of metal clanging in the garage. I resist the urge to advise and wait. k comes up in a few minutes with something in his hand that looks like a jagged wheel made out of paper balanced on a pointy steel stick.

"You see the problem?", he says pointing to the wheel, "This, here has worn out. So I just need to get a replacement for it."

Next day, k finishes his coffee in a record time of 5 minutes and rushes to the store to get the part. He returns in a couple of hours waving the parts victoriously (Amma, naan paas agiten style).

"I should be done in half an hour."

Half an hour later, I find k in the now familiar on-top-of-car position again, squinting at the wheel in the motor.

I give up and walk back in.

3 hours later, k comes in looking somewhat exhausted and defeated, his hands black from whatever it is that motor ejected on him.

"Want to call the guy?"

"If my test run fails, yes, am planning to..."

Men are like that. They will not ask for help if their life depends on it.

Five minutes later, k walks in looking somewhat more exhausted.

"Want to call the guy?"

"Let me wash my hands first and then clean up and then..."

And so on. Postpone the asking-for-help bit as much as possible.

Finally, surprise! k calls the guy after a record 8 hours of working on the garage.

"He said 70 bucks. If I had known earlier, I would have probably called him yesterday."

Yeah. I bet you would have called him.



1 comment:

VeeKay said...

Interesting episode, but then cannot stereotype every man

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