What Are You Thinking When Staring Into Space?

The sun shining through the front door of Kim’s studio on a crisp fall day over the weekend invited me to come bask in its warmth.

After I had stood there staring into space for a couple of minutes, I had a flashback to when I was a teenager.

My first job that didn’t involve a lawn mower or a hay wagon was at an auto parts store.

I was pretty non-essential. In fact, I think the owner — who went to my church and lived in my neighborhood — hired me mostly as a favor.

I worked a couple of days a week after school and all day on Saturdays through most of high school.

My job consisted of lots of dusting, both in the front of the store and in the back where all the spark plugs, distributor caps, radiator thermostats and so on were kept.

My parts boxes were pristine.

On Saturdays when it was busier, though, I would primarily work up front. I learned to look up parts in the massive 6-foot-long catalog rack, then go back and get what the customer needed.

The trick was knowing which catalog to look in based on what kind of part it was.

Spark plugs were in the Champion catalog. Radiator hoses were made by Gates. Rotor buttons were AC Delco.

I could mix automotive paint, which was fun. I rang up the customers I waited on.

The other employee was an interesting guy who had worked there a long time. In the beginning, he came off as being a little gruff, and I had to gain acceptance.

But he took a shine to me, and after a while, joking around with him was one of the perks of working there.

Every Saturday afternoon around 4:00 or so, when business typically slowed down, he would walk to the front of the store and prop his foot up on a stack of Coca-Cola cases next to the drink machine.

He would light up a cigarette, put his elbow on his knee, rest his chin in his hand, and he would just stare out the window into space, squinting when the smoke wafted toward his eyes.

I never interrupted him. And I always wondered what he was thinking.

Was he wondering what 10 years in the future looked like, or was he just basking in the sun?

I was there to earn a little spending money. This was his career, or at the time at least I assumed it was.

I hadn’t thought about that time of my life in years until the other day when I found myself looking out the window staring into space.

I googled him, and what I feared turned out to be the truth.

His obituary was the first thing that popped up.

He died about 7 years ago, and that made me sad.

The obit didn’t say anything about his professional life, but he and his wife had a couple of kids and some grandchildren. So I am sure he had a fulfilling life.

I was stunned to learn that when I knew him he was in his early 30s. I always thought he was older. He looked it.

It’s funny how something can trigger a memory.

This was a good one.