Finding Beauty in Another Man's Trash

I've inherited tackle box tool boxes.  I actually don't know what they are.  I believe they were tool boxes to begin with (I mean, being sold as such), as the original one says something about tools in the name, but they were only used as tackle boxes.  I'm not surprised as my paternal grandmother used some tatting shuttle for trot lines, because she was crafty that way.  

The first is navy blue & was used by my paternal grandparents for their fishing, at least in the early days, as I'm sure they upgraded at some point.  Dad took that home with him the last time we were up there.  Now, I have dismantled it & salvaged any fishin' gear that we might use & chucked the rest.  It is now my tool box.  

Came across dad's first tackle box in the garage recently.  I have dismantled that, washed it out (just like the other) & now it is my art box.  Didn't salvage much from it, but a few lures, because they are from the 60's & are cool & I'm going to make earrings out of them (minus the hooks, of course). 

There's also a hammer that my paternal grandfather made.  He welded several things together to make one giant, fuck-off hammer.  It's almost double a normal hammer & weighs a ton.  Dad collected that on our last trip & well... now it belongs to me, because I was his only wingman on that trip & now that he's gone, no one else wants it.  I won't be using it as it's more like driving railroad spikes into metal sorta hammer, but still it's beyond cool. 

Another newly acquired item was a magnetic tray.  Mainly for mechanics.  You just throw your bolts in there & they won't roll away into the grass or whatever.  But I'm forever working with little screws & thumb tacks & all sorts of little metal things that want to roll away.  Dad had four (that we found... because he'd always loose things & go buy a new one, but of course if he were still alive these things would be off limits & I get that), but I have that for projects of the non-motorized variety.

There were some tan & orange tackle boxes that my paternal grandparents gave to my dad in the 80's as a Christmas gift.  I have the little one (washed out) as my earring holder.  I remember when they gave this entire set to him for Christmas in the mid-80's.  They'd bought themselves a set, so bought him one.  I thought they were BEAUTIFUL.  That tan & see-through orange colour combo.  Just stunning, y'all.  I always wanted them.  It was a five piece set, but after so much time & use only one big box & one smaller one were still usable, though dad hadn't gotten rid of any of it & used rubber bands & tag wire to keep the broken one's together.  I get that.  He really dug his parents & he liked that gift.  But we got rid of the broken ones & kept the big one for if/when we go fishing.  

I am pleased as punch to have this little one as my earring holder.  What girl wants some vintage tackle box as her earring holder?  I'll wait. 

I even have some vintage keychain that floats (for fishing) from a boat place in Vidalia, LA (does it even still exist... they do!), which is where my paternal grandparents settled in the 70's.  It has the key to our fire box on it.  Why?  Because it's fucking cool looking & where the hell else are you gonna find something like this outta like 1984?

You would think I'm real big into fishin'.  Not so.  I don't mind it.  I'll do it.  I've crabbed off of piers (where you tie stinky chicken innards into nets) & gone soft shelling & flounder gigging at low tide, & I enjoy casting out & reeling in from a bank, I'll even bait my own hook, but I'm really not that big into fishin'.  But I come from a fishin' family.  So, I wanted those tan tackle boxes ever since dad got them for Christmas simply because I liked how they looked.  I need a tool box & an art box & what do we have?  Old tackle boxes that haven't been used or cleaned out in at least thirty years.  I don't need to go out & buy anything.  

I've actually inherited quite a few things that only I really want.  All the boy stuff as it were.  My older sister wants pretty things.  She has a pretty box that is made for jewelry.  Very girly.  What do I have?  Well... I had nothing, but now I have that small fishin' tackle box.  I also have the boxes that my paternal grandfather's watch came in.  The plastic one that's supposed to look like tortoise shell or wood or whatever & the brown cardboard one that the plastic one came in.  Dad took this home after his dad died.  I don't think he got the watch, just this set of boxes, which I always loved.  

What else do I have that dad brought home after his dad died?  This ring.  My grandpa was a mechanic for Haliburton, which is why they lived all over Arkansas, then moved to Laurel (where dad met mom), & later to Vidalia.  So these were... tie pins?  Or just pins?  For various years of service.  One with a diamond & one with a ruby.  Dad was a jeweler & I guess his dad asked if he could make a ring out them?  Or dad brought it up?  I'm not sure.  I'm only certain that dad did do this for his dad.  From hand.  No disappearing wax, no casting, but from hand, which isn't easy in the jewelry world.

However, dad was never proud of it.  Thinking he could have done it much better.  Dad was like that.  A perfectionist & thinking the finished product wasn't up to standard.  His dad, however, was real proud of it.  I, personally, think it looks phenomenal.

It's like the deck.  We had a deck off the kitchen/den.  The wood rotted because it's south Mississippi.  So, dad decided to build a sundeck for mom.  This is why my dad was cool, y'all.  So, there's just two sides for the house & one metal beam in the southeast corner.  Dad had a Sears fix-it book & said, "I bet I could do that.", so he did.  He'd never built a fucking room before.  With a roof.  Installed the myriad of windows himself & the door.  

He felt it was... imperfect.  But he built an entire room out of nothing... in midair.  Simply because he felt that he could.  Sure, it probably wasn't perfect & later he'd say that the grading for the roof was off (as roofers would say was also true), but for someone who'd never built a fucking roof he did a pretty fantastic job.  I mean, it lasted about 30 years before it got a leak.  If I'd built that room & roof it might have looked pretty, but it would have been like cardboard & tissue paper & would have fallen in if you looked at it wrong.  That room is still standing with no problems (it was just the roof, which I got fixed).

I was thirteen when my grandpa died & dad brought this ring home.  That was my first time with death & grief & I was so young & it didn't hit the same for me (though my grandpa was awesome), so when dad had it & was practically throwing it around like he wanted it away from him, I told him I loved it & that I wanted it, which he yelled at me that I couldn't have it.

Then tried to be nice.  "It's yours.  You can have it, later, when I'm gone.  But don't touch it now."  I understood later it's because it was bittersweet for him.  But I don't really have grief mixed up in... things.  The other was the '47 Ford dad bought so him & his dad could work on it.  I didn't know, at the time, that he destroyed all the work they'd done when grandpa died.  

He was talking about needing to fix it up, so I offered to help & got the same reaction.  His bitter anger coming out on me, but I didn't understand at age 15 why this was happening.  I do now.  Or I did even a few years after that incident.  'Oh, the car is basically grandpa... got it.'.

He did give me the ring, as a birthday gift, a few years before he died.  It's one of my most prized possessions, but sadly I can't wear it.  I can wear some men's rings & if they are tapered underneath I can use this telephone cord looking stuff that makes the ring fit better, but not with something with as wide a band as this one.

I also have this green men's jewelry thing that dad got for graduating high school.  There's even a place for tie clips, which of course I'm not using.  It's not like I'm grabbing at these things merely because they were my dad's.  He's gone, we need to decide what to keep & what to get rid of, I need jewelry holders or tool boxes, so I'm keeping what I like.  And I do like this one.  He has a wooden jewelry box, but I don't like that one.  I like this green one.

But we'll move back to mechanics now, even though I already showed the tray.

I have the timing gun that my paternal grandpa gave my dad in the 80's.  I've taken it out of its case & hung it on the fucking wall in here in the office.  You think I'm kidding, but it's so beautiful that I practically lost my head with joy over it when Lil' Small presented it to me.  Which she did so because she has absolutely no interested in it & thought I might like it.

I'd never seen this before.  They used it once on one her older cars, but never for any vehicle I drove or while working on cars with dad.  

The other day I found the engine analyzer.  As you can see, my paternal grandparents were big on Sears.  Anyway.  I've never seen this before either.  I get not seeing the timing gun as it's in a flat, metal, slightly rusted brief case looking box that was slid underneath the '47 with all sorts of other things.  But this is just it's only square box with a handle.  

The '47 is obviously used as storage.  There are no windows, so one (ahem, dad) can just put something in through either window.  You could open either door too.  The trunk space is full of stuff as well.  I get that it might have been covered by folded tarps in the seating area.  

However, two months ago we had people here offering to clean our garage a little while looking for tractor parts on the tractor they'd just bought from us.  They did move things around.  But!  There are several times when I get out to the garage and am waiting around for Lil' Small & I just look around.  Or just getting in & out of the car.  The other night was the first & only time I've seen a little box sitting on top of the tarps & stuff inside the '47.  

I've had at least eight times in the past two months to notice this (just from standing around in there, not the getting into & out of our car).  It's not that I don't park in the right bay, right beside the '47 & get out seeing into the '47 or passing it; getting around it to gain the doorway onto the breezeway to get into the house.  Or the other way around, coming from the breezeway to walk around it to get to our car.  I'd have seen this.  So, who gently placed it there?

No seriously.  The first is my view when sitting in the car, the second is when I stand up & get out of the car, the third is when I enter the garage.  I know it's low lighting, but you'd notice a box when all there are is a pile o' stuff with folded tarps on top.  This is what I've seen for months.  Just those tarps.  No box thing, then BAM suddenly a box thing.  It's hard to not notice the interior of this car when entering the garage or exiting the car.  You're RIGHT there.  Mere inches away.  So...

I'm gonna say my ghost-not a ghost dad or either him & grandpa, knowing I would like it.  Because once I saw it I about lost my head just like with the timing gun.

"What... what is this?!?  *gasp!!*  Oh!  It's so beautiful!!!!" with hearts for eyes.

Because I do love it.  Not because it's automotive related & not even because it was dads or that my grandparents gave it to him as a gift.  It's just... beautiful in it's design.  Secondly is because it was dads & that his parents gave it to him.  But, I'd want this even if I saw it at a yard sale with no family associations attached to it.   But the family association does make it that much better.

If you think I'm kidding, I've already brought it inside, removed the cables from the back opening to check for bugs, & cleaned it all out.  Now it's in here in the office & on a shelf being displayed.

You can just call me Ariel, only instead of a flounder & crab as friends I have cats & name the spiders that live outside our windows.  Instead of compasses & broken forks I have random man stuff.  I even ended up singing her doo-hickey song (from the hugely popular animated film from 1989) in the kitchen, twirling around as I got windex & a sponge & a towel to clean this.  

"Look at this stuff!  Isn't it neat?!  Wouldn't you think my collections complete!!!!!"

or whatever.

'I mean, I know I watched this a lot as a kid, but why do I know this song so well?!?', then I'd laugh.  Because it was almost the entire song.

I'm not even kidding when I say I have random, man stuff collections.  There's an industrial valve that's gotta weigh 20 pounds (which I rescued from the trash because Lil' Small threw it in there), a bar of metal that says STERLING (in front of that), a slab of brass, an old water spigot, a 2 pound fishing weight, & a miniature clamp press.

I actually have way too much stuff.  Too many collections of things.  Which I am trying to pair down, especially since I'm adding to it.  It's not easy as I find too many things fascinating.  Like a book on TV repair from 1981 or a plastic, golden piggy that used to hold a facial serum.  

I've got to Marie Kondo it up in here.  Only keeping the things that make me happy.  But I am motivated, so I have a good feeling about it.