Lucky

We’ve all met those people that for one reason or another, everything just seems to go right. My mother used to say of these people, “She could fall in a sewer and find a diamond ring!” I don’t think we wish them any ill, but I suppose we are a tad envious.

In a way, I guess we all have some aspect of our lives that the Gods smile down upon. Some of us are lucky at love, some are lucky in business, some are lucky with their health and others are just plain lucky. Today I am envious of those people that just seem to know things intuitively.

I don’t begrudge someone that has spent years studying just how to paint realistic looking clouds or water, or the guy that spends all his free time playing the guitar. They deserve to be good. No, I am talking about those people who can take a broken radio/bike/TV/car/bridge and with one look, just get down to fixing it. I had a neighbour like that. Ron would just look at a motor and know what was wrong. Once I had a timing belt go on me and the dealer told me it would be $1500 to fix it. I didn’t have $1500, and I didn’t have the knowledge to fix it myself. I told Ron and he said “I’ve never done it before, but I’d be willin’ to give ‘er a go.”

He told me what parts I needed and before you know it, there was half of my engine spread out on the floor of the garage, with all of the nuts and bolts tossed into an overturned hub cap. I asked how he knew which ones went where, and he just said that there is only one place they belong. Sure! He had it back together in a few hours and it never gave me any trouble after that. Ron is mechanically lucky.

My uncle Alex was musically lucky. He could pick up any instrument and play it reasonably well within five minutes, well in half an hour and in an hour he would be entertaining anyone that would listen. Alex was a printer by trade.

I have a friend who is lucky in that he always has a positive mental attitude, no matter what kind of shit happens to him. He can lose a job and know that at some point in the future he will have another, possibly better job. He will have car trouble and someone will introduce him to their neighbour Ron. I am not sure if that is luck or a positive mental attitude, but he is lucky to have what he has.

I worked with this girl/woman that spent the first 25 years of her adult life travelling the world. She would hop on the train/bus/boat/plane and when she got off, she would start to make friends and find the most interesting things. She didn’t worry about where she would rest her head, because eventually she would be tired enough to rest where ever she was. When she ran out of money, she would get a job; if she were hungry she would work for food. In any of those situations I would be catatonic.

I am lucky with family and health I guess. I’m not complaining, but I could do with being lucky, lucky for a little while.

Today I was half lucky. The air conditioning is down on both cars and it is hot. I called the Toyota place and was told it would be in the neighbourhood of $200 to fix or recharge the system. I opted to try the do-it-yourself method. I bought the hose and canister for $40 and with just a little trouble, I now have a car that is actually cool to drive in. With that success under my belt, I tackled Louise’s Echo. I had the hose already and for $15 I got another canister. I did the same thing I did on my car, but for some reason, it didn’t work on Louise’s car. Bummer! See, half lucky. It is going to cost a couple of hundred bucks to get it working again.

I wish Ron still lived across the alley and when he heard of my predicament he’d say “I’ve never done it before, but I’d be willin’ to give ‘er a go.”