On the general topic of “Why do people do the things they do?” my neighbor is always curious and never hesitates to ask my opinion. Sometimes, I have an answer ready for him, and when I don’t, I usually make something up. This time I said I thought there were some folks who did what they did mostly in response to what I call a tool fixation, and he said, “So, go on.”

Well, I told him, that Uncle Mark says, that to a kid with a hammer, everything looks like a nail, and the implication is that some folks can become fixated on a tool. Not everything benefits from multiple blows from a hammer. Even a gentle blow from a hammer does not improve a bowl of pudding, a Swiss wristwatch, or a finger joint. Tool fixation with a hammer should be confined to the construction industry.

In a similar way, to a kid with an air rifle, everything looks like a target, and the faster it moves, the more challenge to the marksman. As a young man, I was guilty of this one, but much to my everlasting sorrow, was cured by success. After much practice with the air rifle, I became an accomplished marksman. I could hit a wire insulator at the top of a telephone pole with great regularity if I gauged the wind correctly.

My undoing came about when I aimed carefully at small bird that had already made several swooping passes across the back yard of my home, and, taking careful aim and leading the target just right, brought down the poor thing with one shot, right in the middle of one happy swoop. After rushing over to help the bird take flight again, the lesson hit me like a blow to the head accompanied by a bucket of ice water down the gullet and a sick stomachache. The bird could not fly again, nor do anything else that birds do.

The lesson was a very painful one, and very clear. Don’t kill anything that you can’t bring back to life. I should have known better. It had been a nice, and very accomplished bird, and I have felt badly about my deed for the many, many years I have been carrying the event around in my head.

Asked if that was the only lesson I learned from the fateful shot, I had to admit that there was a corollary. Don’t destroy what you can’t rebuild. And that’s it, he asked? What, then, is the overarching rule that comes out of all of this, he wanted to know?

With the right tools, you can do just about anything, but that doesn’t mean that you should.

He asked for examples, but I suggested that he could probably think of some himself, and he said he would. He smiled and suggested we get out the cutting tool and fixate it on some bread and cheese. So, we did.

Orrin Frink is a Kennebunkport resident. He can be reached at ofrink@gmail.com.

Copy the Story Link

Comments are not available on this story.