The "Two Down and One To Go" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Just got back from the hardware store with the bad news.  My Black and Decker 8" power saw just bit the dust.  I was using it last week to rebuild the top of a picnic table that is part of our deck behind our house when it just wouldn't turn on.  Took it to the hardware store for what I thought was a new set of brushes, but they told me the problem I was experiencing wouldn't be corrected with brushes.  They could take it apart and see what the problem might be, but that would cost me $50 for the service.  Now I might have done that with a fairly new saw, but this one was a gift from my wife in 1967 and parts might not be available anymore to repair it.  That was the first Christmas we shared together as husband and wife in our apartment at Manor House in Lancaster, PA.  We agreed to buy each other one big item and very little else, since we were just getting started in our marriage and needed the money for other items.  Carol bought me the saw and I got her a Viking sewing machine.  But, by buying the sewing machine I also got a bonus.  A free Husqvarna gas chain saw.  Wow, I snapped 

 that up pretty fast.  Carol loved the sewing machine and I got a really neat saw that lasted almost 50 years to go along with a chain saw that cut many a tree branch off and damaged a few more items that I didn't know were in my path as I operated the chain saw.  The chain saw lasted at the most 10 years before it ran out of steam, but my power saw lasted almost my lifetime.  And, I used it for just about everything.  Used it when my cousin's husband and I installed siding on houses in the late 60s and 70s, for building a porch on the side of my home on Janet Ave., for taking the 3rd floor of that home and making it into a bedroom/bathroom/closet combo for our two sons, and for a variety of other construction projects.  As for the Viking, it still works fine, but Carol has decided it is best left in the closet, since she isn' making curtains, baby clothes, etc. anymore.  I guess you could say we got a lifetime of service from our initial Christmas gifts we gave to each other back in '67.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.