Mr Goodwrench

After I graduated from Powelson Business Institute in downtown Syracuse, I walked over to Niagara Mohawk put in an application for a job.  It was the first and only place I applied.  I had graduated with a 3.97 GPA in their Secretarial program and I was pretty good at typing and shorthand.  (My GPA was 4.0 before I met Mark and my mother insisted that he ruined me because my GPA went down after we met!)  I didn’t really think NiMo would hire me because the rest of the entire world wanted to work there and I knew they had many, many applications.  I dropped off my application, walked to the bus stop and took the 30-minute ride home.  When I walked in the door, my mother said, “a lady from Niagara Mohawk called and wants you to call her back.”  So, I had the job within minutes of applying.  The pay was astronomical compared to other places.  This was an incredible opportunity and I think this is when Mark and I started to talk about our future together.  Mark worked at Bresee Chevrolet as a parts runner before we were married.  He drove a pickup truck with a giant hat on it.  Must be he had a thing for hats!  The truck said “Mr. Goodwrench” on door.   His hat and his shirt said “Mr. Goodwrench” on it.  I found out later, however, Mark didn’t have one single “good wrench” skill.  He couldn’t fix anything, ever.  Once he tried to fix a leak under the sink in our house and he spent about $150 on supplies (wrenches, plumbing tape, gloves, etc.) and then proceeded to split the pipe all the way down under the sink and the floorboards.  I remember as he pulled the trap off the pipe under the sink, he saw the gunk in the trap, ran into the bathroom and got sick.  It cost us another $500 to repair the damage from the water leak under the flooring!  My dad, on the other hand, fixed virtually everything, including my Timex watch, taking it all apart, mixing a bunch of different household oils, and putting all the gears back together.  There wasn’t anything that my father considered a challenge.  And then there was Mark.  Oh my.  I mistakenly thought all men could fix things because my brothers were just like my dad.  Anyway, Mark had other good qualities, right??  He would come in his truck and pick me up and take me to lunch every time he was in the neighborhood for parts delivery.  We usually went to Arby’s or McDonalds because they were the closest to where I work.  He would play his Pink Floyd or Asia or Jethro Tull music and we would sit in the car and eat our lunch and then he would drive me back. I am trying to remember if Mark had any goals other than working at Bresee Chevrolet for the rest of his life, but I don’t think he did.  He seemed happy there and loved driving around all day.  His one arm was very dark and tanned from hanging it out of the truck.  He really seemed like everything was going fabulously.  I thought so too.  My mom and dad weren’t as thrilled about it.  Tomorrow I will tell you about a pizza hut dinner that almost kicked Mark out of our family for good!!