Thirty-two years ago, probably sometime last month, I stepped into the local full-service filling station for my first day of work.

Yes, you read right. 

Full-Service Filling Station.

Thirty-two years ago, was a different era entirely.

We weren’t so very far removed from being able to dial the last four digits to reach someone local on the rotary dial telephone.

And, if you stood near enough to the phone, while it was still on the hook, and listened closely, you would hear a tink sound.  I say tink, because to me it sounded like a cross between a click and a ting. 

If a person was really careful, they could gently lift the receiver, holding the hang up button down until you had the receiver up by your ear, and then, just as gently let the hang up button up, and, viola!, you were listening in to the 4 or so others who were hooked in to your line. 

Of course, we all got savvy to that little click on the other end that told of someone picking up and we’d stop to say, “Did someone just pick up?”  Whereupon there was a guilty silence and then the hang up click could be heard.  On the other hand, that little trick was somewhat important, because when the line was busy, no one else could make a call until the two people having their long afternoon chat got finished, and, sometimes, if they heard that click enough times, it would urge them to hang up.

Cordless phones house phones, forget cordless phones in your pocket, hadn’t made an appearance yet.  If you made a call, you stayed anchored nearby the earpiece and base linked by a three-foot cord, unless, of course, you had extra funds and then you had a ten foot cord.  That cord served a good purpose.  It was the precursor to the fidget spinner long before its time.  You could sit there and unwind and wind back up the spiral for as long as the conversation carried.

You still saw the occasional two-banger tractor working away out in the fields.

Cabless tractors were common, and the odd cabless combine was still around.  The only way to pull a straight furrow was to have it in you to begin with.  All the rest of us suffered snide remarks about how much more crop we had in our fields because of the meandering rows.

Center pivots were a novelty that only the wealthy could afford.  Almost everyone had little tablets on our pickup dashes with numbers printed on them that we could circle when we walked rows to show which rows didn’t have water while the rest had water that had made it down to the bottom end of the field with the flood irrigation we used.

We didn’t know the technicalities of cancer; only knew it was bad.  We didn’t connect it to swimming in mucky, smelling like chemical tail water pits.

The railroad track through town was still new enough, straight enough, and smooth enough, that if you didn’t watch for when the train came through, it could be a real menace if you happened to be in the middle of the track.  Because the train ran fast back then.

And, that Santa Fe still pulled a legit caboose that did legit work.

If you were lucky, you still sighted the occasional Hoozhalicht, or rabbit light, a left-over phenomenon from the dust bowl years.

The only blinking lights were the occasional radio tower.  The twinkle down low that told of running irrigation was still some years away.

We told the weather by looking out southwest about eight miles and when the shed out there disappeared, we figured there was a good chance we’d get rain.

But I must stop, or I may be found guilty of George Santayana’s “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it too.”

So, let’s get back to the full-service filling station, owned by Evan, and named, Evan’s Tire and Oil, or, ET&O by those of us who worked there.

It was a place where you listened for the ding of the air gong which signaled that a car had rolled up for gas.  We attendants pumped the gas for them, checked their oil, washed their windshield, and, if they wished, checked their tire pressure.

It was a place where you got your windows cleaned and the interior of your car vacuumed when you had it serviced.

It was a place where we went to pick up red Lincoln town cars from beautiful, older, rich ladies for a hand wash.

And, in that car particularly, there were rows and rows of cassette tapes, never mind CD’s or downloadable mp3 files, with Vince Gill, Alan Jackson, or Patty Loveless to croon you company if you thought you could sneak it off.

We weren’t so concerned about safety there. 

Of course we were, but not to the extent we are today.  If we had been, we wouldn’t have worked under that air powered, no protection stops at all, vehicle lift that always twisted a bit clockwise when it got to the top.  Neither would we have dared each other to see how long beyond the top of that cylinder we held the control lever to see how much the car bounced at the top of its travel.

It was also a place where I first learned how to count change.  Because the first time I tried to, I realized I knew nothing whatsoever about it.

It was a place from which I came home in the evening with greasy hair from the particulates that the oil burner heater put into the air inside that building.

It was the place where I puked up the contents of my first McDonalds hamburger into the wash pit.  I guess one could call that an emergency pit stop.

It was also a place of serious conversation, and not so serious but something stopping just short of antagonistic conversation with the salty bookkeeper.

It was a workplace to an employee, (not me) who was deathly afraid of wasps and who ran at an all-time record to get away from such small insects.

It was witness to almost daily squirt bottle water fights and red rag snaps that left four-hour welts.

It was the place where I learned to tear down a truck tire using only a sledgehammer and tire irons, and, if normal procedures didn’t work to bead that tire back up, then a good whoop of ether squirted into the tire at the end of a lighted match would normally get the job done.

And now, after thirty-two years, I find myself the owner of that place.

And when I walked into it to look things over for the first time, I was sixteen years old right away.

Because nothing had changed. 

The oil burner still hung in the southwest corner.

The same cash register that I learned to count change on was still there.

The same mirror I looked back at myself from to see a rather pale face after that puking episode was still on the wall.

The same lift, the same shelves, the same bulk oil building outside.

The same tire racks, and even a few leftover innertubes still lay on the shelves.

The same behemoth forced air unit for the office, the same counter, less the candy in the glass fronted shelves.

Even the same sounds and the same smell.

Except, it couldn’t be used for us as it was originally.

So, we set about gutting it to repurpose it for a new use as an electrical inventory warehouse/office building.

All the shelves came down. 

The oil burner got tossed.  (it took a skid steer to man handle it)

Conduit was ripped from the walls and ceiling.

Lights and ceiling fans were discarded.

Paint is being removed in a slow process that peels back the layers of history, one oil-based coat at a time.

The two bathrooms are no more.

The cinder block wall at the back of the original office has gone to smash.

The mirror I looked in and sink I washed my hands in were spirited away to the trash bin.

The candy counter is gone; a different cabinet and flooring is waiting to be installed.

And I thought I was holding up pretty well, and staying fairly enthused with the vision of the new project.

Until I had the boys unbolt the arms and base from the lift.

And even then, it really didn’t get me.

Until I had that car lift loaded in the skid steer bucket, and I looked down. 

There, I saw the form of what seemed to be an innocent one who had done his duty, and now lay in quiet repose, its arms and legs sagging in slumber.

And, I almost got me a little tear in my eye.

Written in Patrick Dugan’s, while I shared a coffee with Mama J.

P.S. Towards the end of this month marks three years I have met with you here. 

I have enjoyed it.