Turn, Turn, Turn

I am in the process of cleaning out my garage once again.  It is really amazing how cluttered and filthy it can get and how quickly it can get that way.  There are so many non-shop related things in there now, what I really need is more space like another shed or something.  Since that is not going to happen I just need to use what little space I have more intelligently.  So be it.

A while ago I was moving my Craftsman 190-piece socket set when I dropped it (well, 188 piece, really, since two sockets were missing from the set originally... typical Craftsman lack of quality control).  Since Craftsman also made the case it was in, most of the sockets and wrenches came loose and fell in a jumbled pile in the bottom of the closed case. 

Nice.

They stayed in this jumbled pile for a long, long time.  I finally got tired of rifling through the mess for sockets I needed so I brought the "set" out onto the driveway and began the task of sorting them.

My son has learned over his 1,000 days of existence that my tools are "mucho verboten" and therefore "interesting beyond all measure".  I was about one quarter of the way through my task when he came out to play.  He saw me and the glorious pile of shiny, candy-like off-limit-ness, approached quietly with a look of hopeful trepidation on his face and asked "What are you doing, Daddy?"  I told him and then he said "Can I help, too?".

Now, this task is clearly beyond the capabilities of any two year old you care to name, but I want him to be exposed to real tools (not just Handy Manny's, for instance) in a safe, controlled manner.   So... how to say "Yes" without him undoing all the work I had done so far...

I said "OK.  Let's see if you can do this."   He plunked down in front of me with a huge smile on his face.  "I want you to take all of the wrenches and put them in a pile here".  He nodded and lined up the twenty or so what he calls "wraaaynches" (it's one of three words he speaks with an outrageous Southern accent for some reason) while I continued sorting parts. 

"All done," he said, proudly indicating the crooked arc of tools on his right side.  "Good job, buddy!  Want to do more?"  "Yes!" came the rapture-filled response.  "OK.  Let's see if you can do this."

I held up a socket and said "See this?  This is called a 'socket'.  It fits on a socket wrench."  I clicked it into place and handed the wrench to him.  I held up a couple more sockets "Now, see this one?  It has a number, a line, then another number.  That's called 'English'.  Say 'English'".

"English," he says, taking the socket and looking at it.

"Now see this one?  It only has one number and it is called 'metric'.  Say 'metric'".

"Metric," he said, and examined the other.

"Now, I want you to take all the English ones and put them in a pile here, and all the metric ones and put them in a pile over there."

"OK," he said and got to work.  Slowly at first, looking to me for nods of confirmation that he was doing this task correctly, but then he got into a groove and I just got mesmerized watching him go through the sockets while talking to himself :

"English.  English.  Metric.  English.  Metric... no... English"

My wife came out and broke the spell I was under and I asked her to go get her phone and so we could record some video for posterity.  It might just be me, but I swear in the video the look on his face when he picked up certain metric sockets was one of slight annoyance, the inkling of a nucleus of the look you or I develop over the years when we discover what we are sure is a one-half inch bolt-head is actually requires a 12-millimeter socket.

He finished up and, although the sockets still needed to be sorted by width, height, wrench size, and type, the metric and English piles were error-free. 

He had completed his first official "chore".  Awesome.  Picking up his toys does not count as a "chore", btw.  Helping me pick mine up sure does, though.

The next day the garage cleanup was still underway and once again he came out and asked if he could help.  I handed him a pile of very dusty and dirty crescent wrenches (I own an unnecessarily large number of them) and a rag and asked him to clean them up. 

He said "OK," sat on the floor and happily got to work.  He did pretty good and stayed on task until he was done then grabbed his chalk and went out in the driveway to draw with Mommy.

Again, awesome.  But it won't last forever.

The novelty of sorting drill bits, scrap wood pieces, etc. will wear off sooner than later, I know.  No matter what kind of Tom Sawyer-ish tricks I try to get him to whitewash the metaphorical fence one day the "joy of helping Daddy" is going to naturally evolve into "begrudging compliance " (at best). 

I choose, however, to embrace the happiness of "now", and forgive him ten years in advance for not whistling "Zippity-Doo-Dah" while being forced to mow the lawn before he can join his friends to play Zero-Gravity Robotic Hover Lacrosse or whatever the hell kids will be doing for fun in the year 2021.

Soon the garage will be clean and there won't be a need for my little assistant to "help" me sort scrap wood pieces and whatnot. 

Maybe he can help me build him his own mini-workbench, though...  I will even donate some of my spare "wraaynches" (did I mention that word has four syllables?) to get his toolset started.

Sounds like a project to me!