There is something to be said for fiddling, for taking apart and reassembling without a manual, for hunching in the garage floor with your bicycle’s wheels, and chain, and brakes laid out like a patient’s guts in a poorly lit surgery theatre. There is something to be said for repairing.

My grandfather was a physician, a fixer of the highest order. He operated on stomachs and hearts, limbs and intestines, because in his day, specialists were rare, and general practitioners were operating-room fixtures. He built things at home, too. His basement workshop was heaped with tools on an ugly, practical worktable.… Read the rest