I remember our garage when I was young smelling of oil and grease. There were outdated calendars hanging crooked on the wall lined with old license plates. Oil and grease stood thick on the table, the dilapidated tool box sprawled open with hammers, wrenches, socket and otherwise flowing across the workbench, like a cornucopia on a Thanksgiving table. Below the table was a catchall of rags, cans, and anything necessary for fixing motors. Tires leaning against the cement block wall, mowers with their guts laying on the floor. Their days of mowing had ceased for the time being or at least until my grandpa resurrected it.
I remember watching my dad and grandpa working, he/grandpa always seemed as if he was smiling his face was crunched up, but that’s just what his face did. A few minutes later he’d pull out Prince Albert in a can, rolling papers and roll a cigarette, put it on his lip then light it and continue talking, it’d bounce up and down, it was all without thought. He also cussed like a sailor it didn’t matter who was around. Cigarettes and cussing, wow.
Cigarettes, grease, cars, & trucks, seemed to go hand in hand in the garage.
There aren’t many times when I get to pass through a garage and inhale the memories of those greasy heavenly scents. Who would have thought as a grown woman I would even want to. But when I do I’m the little girl in the corduroy pants and T-shirt stopping in from play to relive the memories of my dad and grandpa doctoring away on their patients. I could see the seriousness that went along with it, an occasional laugh, a cough from the smoke, and Roger Miller on the radio.
Busters daughter and Quaker State miss you both.
Bustersdaughter Remembering 