Something good is hiding underneath the pine straw and dirt.

Something good…and broken.

This is an old Toyota truck that I used on the mail route for a bunch of years.

One day, it broke out on the route. My guess is the timing chain just wore out…too much strain on the old thing…the guides worn…the chain slack…and…it wouldn’t go anymore.

It’s hiding what the problem is right now, though.

I haven’t started tearing into the problem yet…so anything I think it might be is only an “anything I think it might be” kind of situation.

It can be as big a problem as I’m willing and able to make it as long as the solution only exists up in my head.

It’s sat in the driveway for, I guess, a couple of years now…unlicensed and unused.

Never un-loved, though.

People stop and ask if they can buy it…even broken, they want to buy it…but the answer is always no.

I am loyal to the things that are broken.

You can fill up your life with a lot of stuff that “might get fixed someday”.

So, anyway…it’s hiding what’s broken…if only because I really don’t want to find out how bad the problem might be.

We all do that, though, I suppose? Hiding what’s broken?!

Jesse Winchester had a great old song called “Let the Rough Side Drag”….where he sang, “let the rough side drag, let the smooth side show, as you pull your load everywhere you go”….

I guess that’s what I’m thinking about.

And…until I dig into any of it and figure a way back out…a way to get things moving again…I guess I’ll just have to “let the rough side drag” for a while.

I am good at hiding what’s broken.

And…I can be a great and fumbling mechanic when the need gets desperate…and the light is just right.

I should take a bunch of stuff on that old truck apart before the weather turns bad.

Broken is just what hasn’t gotten fixed.

How’s that for optimism?!

I’ve broken enough bolts to know better.