Tonight, I’m in the mood to talk about toolboxes. When I was a wee lad, my grandfather owned a tire shop. Back in the early days, he invented a process for recapping tires. He sold that process to Goodyear and took some of the money and bought a bigger tire shop. His inventory was very large and they were stored on wooden racks. I believe they were six to eight rows high. I’d climb the primitive ladders, made of 2x4s and crawl through the center of the tires. By the end of the day I’d be covered in dirt and black rubber dust.
My grandfather would open a drawer in a big rolling tool chest, grab an air nozzle, hook it up to an air hose, and blow me clean. I’d giggle and giggle. I seriously wanted some alone time with that tool chest. So many drawers, so many shiny tools. Unfortunately, that chest, and all the others in the shop were off limit. My grandfather was very strict, and I didn’t dare cross him. Especially when it came to the shop rules.
My dad worked at a service station, and when he wasn’t busy pumping gas, he was in one of the service bays working on a car. I also spent a lot of time there. Once again, the tool chests were off limits.
By the time I was 9 or 10 my dad had his own service station, and I spent as much time as I could there. So, you can imagine the thrill when my dad walked up to me and gave me my own bright red toolbox. I quickly threw it open to find a set of S-K wrenches, sockets, and screwdrivers. I lugged that thing “to work” everyday I could. When I wasn’t at work, I used those tools to get into a lot of trouble. One afternoon I took apart our washing machine. One evening I took apart our dishwasher. I took apart nearly anything I could get my hands on. In fact, my parents started taking me to garage sales to buy things to take apart, in hopes that I wouldn’t take apart something more valuable.
I’d probably still have the red toolbox if my stepdad hadn’t decided it was in his way and put it outside one winter. I looked all over for it, and when I finally found it under a bunch of other crap, the bottom had rusted out and spilled all my tools when I lifted it up.
Fast forward 10 or 15 years, I was on dirt biking trip with Conehead and Pinhead. We had just gotten to camp and Conehead was helping me unload the truck. At the time I had a cheap plastic toolbox, with way too many tools in it. Conehead was in the truck bed, grabbed it by the handle, and jumped to the ground. His feet hit the ground and the handle let go. The box hit the ground and shattered, dumping tools everywhere. We laughed it off while cleaning up the mess.
The following Monday I got to work and found a brand-new Craftsman metal toolbox on my desk chair. At the time I shared an office with Conehead. I looked at him, questioningly. He shrugged and said, “my dad always told me if you bust something that belongs to someone else you have to replace it with something better.”
My collection has grown, and I now have added four Craftsman rolling cabinets to the collection. But I still have that original Craftsman toolbox. It has to be 30 years old and has a million miles on it and I will probably still be digging through it the day I die. Sadly, Conehead has passed on, but I make sure I take him with me every time I go riding. I will also always remember what his dad told him and try to follow his lead.
