Ashes to Ashes.

For those unfamiliar with the happenings when Carlos goes out of town let me catch you up.

September 1984: Carlos leaves home and comes back to a daughter.

Between 1984-1995: Carlos leaves the home and comes home to a dog known as Pudsie (hopefully enjoying his new life as a shopkeeper in Kyoto).

1995: Carlos leaves the home and comes home to a dog that we all know and love as Tessa.

So for those keeping track at home, when Carlos leaves things happen. This latest trip was no exception. My mind was full of different ideas that I could fulfill while he is away. The attic, the patio, the storage room, the garage, the possibilities seemed endless. Which job do you tackle? Well for reasons that will become clear to you. I decided to work on the garage. The garage is a place of mystery, similar to the Bermuda triangle in that things will enter and never be found again or you will find things from times of old. Some fun finds include:

Tools possibly pre-dating the Great Depression (allegedly worth lots of money because they are so old).

A car part in the original packaging. The funny part is the newest car mentioned on the back of this package is a 1984 Pontiac.

A plethora of old rusty hangers bent into various shapes (I didn’t throw nearly enough of these away because they really are probably the most useful tools out there).
A Record book which included dates of oil changes and maintenance to “the van” and other old vehicles.

It was the find of this book that really cemented that I had made the right choice in doing a “clean sweep” in parts of the garage. This record book showed me that there exists in some deep part of Carlos a man who desires organization and order and maybe, just maybe by bringing some order back to the garage I could bring part of him back. One major hurdle stood in my way.

The bench.

He had a bench in there.

A bench that he made before I was even brought into this world.

A bench that had withstood the hot humid summers and frigid dry winters.

Year after year that bench stood as a sentinel to the family and cars that came and went. The Saab, the Van, the Tercel, the Other Van, the Maxima, the Acura, The Rattler, The Samurai, the Saturn, and others whose names I can’t even remember.

The Bench was the protector, the vanguard of “the corner” from which all disorganization of the garage came. The corner was nigh impenetrable while the bench stood in its way. I knew it was going to be a fight. Sure enough it took a few days of a open garage while space was made and things were cleared to where I could move the bench out and assault the corner. Once the Bench and Corner were separated they fell easily as their power was in their proximity. The corner shelves hung on with every bent nail clinging desperately in an attempt to avoid the fires that awaited them. But in the end the corner and bench were both vanquished and met their Missouri/Viking Burial.After I destroyed the Bench I felt more than a twinge of sorrow as this old member of the family met its end. In the end my sadness did not linger as I realized in the ashes and dust of the old bench a new bench can be reborn.

A phoenix to rise from the Ashes…

…and I know just the man to build it.


There was quite a lot of stuff that had gathered on the bench and in the corner that is amusing and not mentioned. We did not throw away nearly what we could have and I want to stress the job is not finished in that it needs the master to come home and make it his own space.