- April 28, 2024
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Small businesses are the lifeblood of the economy. I don’t doubt this. Buy local.
I recently patronized a small business — about as small as you can get — and my car has the scars to prove it.
The rear bumper of my car was not pretty to begin with. It had been crunched by a pickup that rear-ended me at a red light about a year ago, and I’d never gotten it fixed.
Then, the other day, a guy pulled into my driveway, knocked on my door and said he could fix it for me for $40. I’d never met him or his friend, who was waiting by his car. But I knew it would cost more than $1,000 to fix it at a real shop, so I said I’d give it a shot.
I learned this is not something you can just “give a shot.” You do it, or you don’t.
They went to work on the plastic bumper, trying to pop out the fold, which was about the size of a taco. They pushed on it with a hammer handle.
I admit I was experiencing some fierce buyer’s remorse at this moment. At the same time, they couldn’t really make the bumper look worse. And I was giving some local guys some business. I went back inside so as not to hover.
I couldn’t concentrate on my work, though, and I wandered back outside. I’m no expert in bodywork, but it seemed they were trying something unorthodox: One guy was kneeling at the side of the car with a spray can and a lighter, and he was shooting a flame about two feet long across the back of the bumper.
“Um,” I started to say.
“Keep going,” one man said to the other. “It’s got to get hot.”
“Um,” I said again, kicking a pebble off my driveway.
They put their weight on the crease and still couldn’t get it to pop out. I sensed a disagreement coming on between them. I’m semi-anti-confrontational, so I went back inside and pretended for as long as I could that my car was in good hands.
A few minutes later, I wandered back outside again and saw one of the men with a contraption that looked like a medieval torture device. It had a screw on one end and various metal pieces up and down a shaft.
“So, whatcha guys doing?” I said.
“We need to make a hole,” the man with the Device said. “It’s a tiny hole, trust me.”
A hole is a hole, I thought. I went back inside, hyperventilating. Then I wheeled back around. I don’t feel comfortable with a hole, I decided.
“Hey guys, wait,” I said, marching back out the door.
Too late.
A second hole was already under construction. As a wise, round-headed man once said, “Good grief.”
“It’s going to look as good as new,” they said. “You’re getting a great deal on this. If you don’t like it, you don’t have to pay.”
As a matter of fact, I was plumb out of cash at the time. Instead of bringing this up, though, I merely observed them pop the bumper back into shape. It actually didn’t look half bad. A smile of relief crossed my lips, until the putty came out.
Goop galore was smeared on the tiny holes. Spray paint. Sealant. Turtle Wax. In the end, the curvature resembled a bumper, but the putty and paint job in a 12-inch patch looked like scar tissue resulting from a shark attack.
“So, do you take a check?” I asked with a friendly grin.
They looked at me. No blinks occurred for several seconds.
“We can follow you to an ATM,” they said.
The story has a happy ending: I survived. But my bumper still has Turtle Wax covering the scar tissue because I’m too scared to wipe it off and look under the bandage, so to speak. And I’ve come to the conclusion that it will take more than just me to turn this economy around.
NEWS FROM HOLLINGSWORTH: ‘THE BATHROOM IS HOT’
If you want to sell art in Palm Coast, Hollingsworth Gallery Curator J.J. Graham has a perfect location.
“The bathroom is hot,” he said.
Graham recently sold his second painting, “Keeping an Open Mind,” from the wall across from the commode in the bathroom. He said someone was walking by, saw the painting through the open door and bought it.
“I figure if I hang my work in the bathroom, people can’t complain if I hang their work in the bathroom,” Graham said. “Plus, my stuff, you have to think about it, so it’s a good place for contemplation.”
Of course, the sale might have something to do with the quality of the art. He also recently sold (not from the bathroom) his masterful “The Ship Song,” which is the worst news I’d heard all day. It was my favorite piece in the gallery. Graham assured me it was going to a good home, but I’ll still miss seeing it.
As I was talking to Graham in his studio, painter Peter Cerreta walked in with a well-worn painter’s apron around his neck. Some of Cerreta’s work is on display in the Small Works show 6-9 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 10.
Cerreta praised Graham’s work and then added a jab to the gut: “About 15 years’ more training, this guy will be good.”
One of the reasons I like going to the gallery is that the creative process for one art form can inform another. Don’t tell anyone, but I’ve been listening to a biography of Robert Redford as I drive around town. (Did you know Steve McQueen, Jack Lemon, Warren Beatty and Marlon Brando were all originally considered as options to co-star with Paul Newman in “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”!?) Some of Redford’s approaches to acting and filmmaking have given me ideas as to how to approach my fiction writing. For example: Choosing the right project is as important as execution.
And Graham is always polishing a golden nugget about art of some kind. He said he tells his students, “You can’t exceed your level of appreciation.”
In other words, you need to keep in constant motion if you want to be inspired as an artist. If you’re stuck, go to a museum. Read a book. Travel.
“At some point you have to create your own art, but in the beginning it’s all about appreciation,” he said.
“Keeping an Open Mind” (left) was sold from the bathroom at Hollingsworth. Artist J.J. Graham joked the bathroom is a good place for his work because it’s a place to think.
“The Ship Song,” by J.J. Graham (right) has been sold for an undisclosed amount to a good home. The painting was completed in 2010 and is 73.5-by-49.75 inches.
