Zen and the Art of Car Maintenance

Originally published in October 2010: 

A flick of the wrist, three pumps, and it’s done.

Resetting the “check oil” light on my wife’s car is as simple as turning on the ignition (without starting the car) and depressing the accelerator three times. I do it after every oil change because either the technicians don’t know how, forget, or – in the words of that immortal scoundrel, Rhett Butler – don’t give a damn.

It doesn’t bother me, because resetting the oil light is one of just seven maintenance tasks I can perform on a car, and this is only if one stretches the definition of maintenance to include things like screwing on the gas cap after fueling.

I remember reading “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” many years ago and getting pretty into it, right up to the point where the author chides readers who operate motor vehicles without knowing how they work. My newly found inner calm went right out the window at that, along with my copy of the book.

America’s fascination with the automobile completely baffles me, as does its obsession with organized team sports. I see a car only in its most practical terms, as a means of conveyance and a place to store all the stuff that my wife would accidentally on purpose throw out if I brought into the house. This is why the backseat of my car has become a mini filing cabinet, home to mountains of paper that fade and yellow from the sun before being transferred to a more permanent home – the trunk.

Because I’ve been denied the gene that extends an aura of mystique to a hunk of steel, chrome and rubber, I’m a difficult customer in a dealership. The salesperson can yammer all day about a sleek chassis and clean lines, but all I’m likely to care about is the mileage and the radio. I have developed a little dog-and-pony show that involves kicking the tires, feigning interest in what lies under the hood, and asking about the flux capacitator, because the ability to travel through time is one of the few add-ons I would pay extra to receive.

Otherwise, cars don’t interest me much. I once went almost four years without changing the oil in a Chevy Nova. Every few months, I would just feed it a new can. That car cost me less money than any car since, and on all the others I’ve made a point to follow a more-or-less routine maintenance schedule. Coincidence or something more? You decide.

Among my other maintenance knowledge is the ability to change windshield wipers and add new washer fluid – in most cases. I say “most” because sometimes the maze of tubes, hoses, wires and such beneath the hood is nearly hypnotic, and I can lose my concentration staring into it, like little Rikki Tikki Tavi being mesmerized by the undulating cobra in that “Jungle Book” story by Kipling.

(Kipling always reminds me of an old cartoon showing a nerdy guy holding a book of the author’s work sitting next to a beautiful woman who looks at him archly and says something like, “You naughty boy, I never kipple on the first date.”)

If I keep my wits about me, I can usually figure out where to put the wiper fluid, just as I can usually decipher the arcane arrows on the arm of the windshield wiper that release the old blade and show how the new one snaps into place.

In this endeavor, I have a perfect track record of always changing blades in the middle of a torrential downpour or a snowstorm, an extra challenge that ups the ante on my stress level considerably.

This is where I could really use that copy of “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.” Maybe I should buy a new one and keep it in the trunk.

chris.schillig@yahoo.com