BoomSpeak

Down At the Factory
Things Are Looking Up

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E  S  S  A  Y  For boomers anyway. Manufacturers in the U.S. depend on baby boomer labor and they are doing whatever it takes to keep us on the job. Around 27 percent of manufacturing workers are over the age of 65.

What’s so great about baby boomers in the factory? For starters, they have experience and knowledge that younger works don’t have. They are loyal. And the best part is they need/want to work.

As enticements to stay on the job, manufacturers are offering flexible schedules, reduced work weeks, and job sharing, along with mentoring and consulting opportunities. Even the ergonomics of the shop floor are being retrofitted to reduce the physical wear and tear on older workers who want to avoid knee and back issues.

The scary aspect of this looming labor shortage for manufacturers is that it’s not just happening in factories. Think about where the next generation of plumbers and electricians are coming from. Or auto mechanics. If you think that plumbing, car engines and the household electrical systems can be engineered to be so simple that expert repair personnel is no longer needed, you are dreaming. If anything, some of these systems are going to get even more complicated as the technology behind them gets more sophisticated. That faucet that comes on automatically when the infrared sensor detects motion? It still can leak under the sink or the sensor can go on the fritz. Millennials don’t even know the meaning of “on the fritz” never mind how to replace a worn out faucet washer.

You might be thinking that robots can pick up the slack but I don’t think that’s the solution. Robots can only intuit so much and a simple short caused by worn wires in a light switch may be beyond their capability.

The solution is to keep boomers on the job and start a serious program for knowledge transfer. Not every millennial wants to be a computer programmer or app inventor. It’s time to give tradespersons the status they deserve, along with better compensation. When a plumber can make as much as a doctor, with a lot less stress, the problem may solve itself. Until then, stay on good terms with your trades people and hope that they keep on keeping on.

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept. His mystery novel, Head Above Water, is available on Amazon and Kindle.

I Wish I’d Taken A
Picture of My Dad

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E  S  S  A  Y   I wish I’d taken a picture of my dad when he was deep in thought, or working at his bench in the garage, or playing his drums. A tight close up of the place he’d escape to when he needed to disappear. A master of concentration, he had a genius for tuning out whatever was going on around him. Especially my mom.

I wish I’d taken a picture of my dad when he explained aviation to my 2 year-old son. Joel hung on his granddad’s every word, looking up at an airplane overhead, pointing, and saying, “Up high!” It was what Dad always said to him so he assumed planes were called “up-highs.” They both loved aviation so much, I’m sure my dad must wear some sort of wings in my son’s memory.

I wish I’d taken a picture of my dad when he had his morning coffee. He was an early riser and liked to sit in his favorite chair working the daily crossword, and by the time I got up he was already at work, in his garage, or doing yard work. My first real “smell memory” is of freshly mowed lawn; I thought it smelled like watermelon. I still think it smells like watermelon and whenever that fragrance wafts by me, I smile.

I wish I’d taken a picture of my dad—I wish I could have taken a picture of my dad—when I performed. No matter where he was from where I stood or sat, his smile always told me how proud he was that his family’s musical genes had been passed down to me, that I was a Waller through-and-through. I remember once when a flute quartet of mine was performed in California, I played for him a recording of it over the phone. When it was done the other end of the line was silent and I feared we’d lost connection. Then I heard his soft, deep voice say, “I can’t say anything, hon. I’m crying like a baby.” I wish I had a picture of my dad at that moment.

I wish I’d taken a picture of my dad one of the many times he walked in my kitchen door bearing a paper bag or two of groceries. He always said he’d only picked up a couple things we needed, but it was always things we wanted but couldn’t afford. Cookies, licorice, a toy for each of the kids, a music magazine for me… He’d come in, pour a cup of coffee and sit down at the table to visit for a while, and then he’d be gone again. These days I only fantasize about him walking in my kitchen door. These days he wouldn’t need to bring anything but himself. That was always enough for me.

SK Waller is an author and composer. Books One and Two (With A Dream and With A Bullet) of her rock and roll series, Beyond The Bridge,  takes places in late 70s London. Read more at SK Waller Blog and SKWaller.com.

Those Crazy Americans

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T R A V E L   I had a lot of fun teasing the French when I lived in Paris in the 70’s. All I had to do was invite friends over, serve four courses instead of seven, make pancakes for lunch, put the salad at the beginning of the meal instead of the end, or – worst transgression of all – dump the meat, potatoes, vegetables and salad all in one plate, American-style, and say, “Voilà!”

It was easy to be a rebel over there, something I’m good at as long as attitude counts more than subversive action. What can I tell you? It was the spirit of the times. I never burned any bras, but, on the other hand, I didn’t wear any either.

In the playground I took off my shoes and squatted in the sand alongside my baby son. And slid down the slides after him. The other French mothers were too busy admonishing their offspring not to get water from the Place des Vosges fountains on their leather-trimmed “playclothes” to have my kind of fun. The occasional father would guide his child up the stairs of the slide like this: “First place your right foot on this step, lift your left foot up x centimeters, now pull yourself slowly up!” The poor child would lose all taste for the adventure ahead and reap the scorn of the other little ones waiting on the steps behind him.

Of course I wore jeans with an embroidered butterfly I had stitched on to cover a hole that was – come to think of it – suggestively positioned on my thigh. Let the françaises prance in their heels and summer dresses. I had scarves in my shoulder-length hair.

Still I looked French enough pushing a baby carriage for one confused American tourist to continue to talk to me in French even after I said, “Listen, you can speak to me in English!”

Other outrages of mine – putting the light on during the day in my darkened apartment before the appointed (?) hour, rinsing dishes with the water running, “insulting” a clove of garlic by not slicing it daintily enough, boorishly putting a container of milk on the kitchen table (instead of a creamer), oh, and picking up my son whenever he cried instead of letting him “make his lungs.”

Not exactly a march on Washington, but I did my darnedest to stand up for the good ole American way of life!

Janet Garber’s satiric novel, dream job, wacky adventures of an HR Manager, available on www.janetgarber.com. She’s working on a second novel about a Franco-American couple living in Paris in the 70’s.

A Freud to Avoid?

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F I C T I O N  I ran into Sigmund Freud the other day (I told you once but I’ll tell you again. It’s my fiction so I can meet up with anyone I like).

We were in front of a smokeshop and he was just coming out the door.

Sig, long time no see. Are you still smoking?

“Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.”

I know, but the research? I mean you must know smoking is bad for you.

“Being entirely honest with oneself is a good exercise.”

Hey, I’m really glad I’ve run into you because I had this dream a few nights ago that —

“The madman is a dreamer awake”

Okay, but this dream was really weird and I can’t figure out what it means.

“If you can’t do it, give up!”

That’s it? What happened to the whole dreams as wish fulfillments and dealing with the unconscious? You’re the man when it comes to understanding repressed thoughts.

“The ego is not master in its own house.”

Boy oh boy, today you’re handing out these bromides like they’re lollypops.

“When inspiration does not come to me, I go halfway to meet it.”

Sig, you know I respect you and the whole thing with the Oedipus complex and the libido, I mean it’s brilliant. You’re brilliant. But sometimes you can be really dense.

“We are what we are because we have been what we have been.”

That explains it. That explains everything. How about a little help here. My dreams make no sense to me and I’m really trying to get to the truth.

“One day, in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful.”

For a guy who’s explored the human mind for a living you can be little flippant about my problem. I’m looking for answers.

“Out of your vulnerabilities will come your strength.”

That’s what I’m talking about. You talk to me like I’m a hopeless case. Can’t you tell me some universal truth, something that will forever improve my psychic condition?

“Time spent with cats is never wasted.”

Jay Harrison is a graphic designer and writer whose work can be seen at DesignConcept. His mystery novel, Head Above Water, is available on Amazon and Kindle.

Guitar Lesson

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A R T S   If we are going to make music together there definitely need to be some ground rules. First of all, we will get along much better if you wash your hands, not sometimes, but as a matter of course whenever you are even thinking about touching my body parts. Who wants germs and/ or lunch fragments coming between us in this relationship? We might not be curing cancer here, but I know that you know that I know that we are going to be intimate. So let’s start off clean shall we?

Your first assignment will be to give me a name. Just do it. B.B. King, Eric Clapton and Willie Nelson all have names for their guitars. Anyway you don’t want to be in a relationship where you don’t have a name for the other party. Imagine a life of being referred to as hey you. The wrong name is like a wrong set of strings. It will mess us both up.

So listen, while its’s technically true that I am Gretsch Boxcar Model 9200 serial number CAXR 165214 that you bought off the internet, can you fit all of that into a name? Meanwhile, before you commit, try using endearments such as “Good morning, beautiful. Are we ready to set the musical world on its ear today?” Yes indeed, you will need to talk to me the same way you talk to your golf balls or chocolate chips. It’s a relationship. We have to relate, Partner.

What a guitar has to say and the way it gets said is the foundation of a relationship with the human voice. Every guitar, of course, has its own particular sound, and it is important to not get in a hurry making demands or blaming each other when things aren’t exactly right between us. Does that sound impossible? Ask your teacher if you need clarification on any of this, and by the way, how’s it going with choosing a name? If you get stuck, consider Carmine, not spelled like the opera, but mysterious, a little wild, and red is the color of your true love’s finish.

I’d kind of like to wrap up this first occasion with an overview: in a relationship, the essence is in the relating. Remember the four agreements: “be impeccable with your word, don’t take anything personally, don’t make assumptions, and always do your best.”

So, same time tomorrow?

Anne Animas lives, writes and hides out in Southern Colorado.

Adios Costa Rica

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T R A V E L  Where’s Fredy when I need him?

Fredy was my “go-to” mechanic in Costa Rica. From brake pads to fuel injectors, shocks to wheel bearings, Fredy could diagnose it, fix it and I would be on my way – usually within a day.  Sometimes he would even deliver the repaired car to the house!

I’m jinxed when it comes to used cars.

We bought a 2013 Hyundai Tucson the day after our arrival back in the U.S. – actually within hours – because our “second” Costa Rican car was a Tucson (Tooc-sun in CR) and it was reliable has heck. BTW: in 2011, we bought a 2004 Tucson for $20,000. In 2017, we paid 1/2 that for a 2013.

We bought the car on Friday, 7/28. First road trip, the A/C was iffy. Since we weren’t sure if it was the 100 degree real feel outside that the a/c didn’t handle it, we drove it the rest of the day. Next day we were convinced it was not US it was the Tucson, we took the car back to the dealer on Monday. They wanted us to leave it but we were running around like crazy house hunting. I took it in on Tuesday. They sent me back on the road after a couple hours, but Wednesday it was not cooling like should. I took it back in to the dealer, he gave us a loaner, and three days later we are still without our car.

We were told today they had reproduced the problem, but needed Hyundai to sign off on the repair. I guess South Korea is kinda preoccupied with Kim Jung Yum Yum because are awaiting further instructions on repair of our car.

Fredy could have rebuilt the damn a/c/ by now.  I’m positive.

If it’s not fixed soon, Nancy may go ballistic before Kim Jung Yum Yum does.

Mark Van Patten writes a blog called Going Like Sixty and has been married to the same woman since 1968.

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