Too much

3/9/2008 4:17 AM EDT

In midblock stood yet another drab, gray building. The sign proclaimed "Montgomery Bike Shop." Through the window, you could see a few new and used Schwinns. The Wright Brothers would have felt at home here. Heck, for all I know, they could have been here.

This shop was different, though. I owned it. Well, I owned half of it. Well, I owned half of 10% of it. The bank owned the rest.

The shop had been run by Verlon, a grizzled old man whose gruff exterior went clean to the bone. He was the owner, salesman, and bike mechanic. His wife ran the cash register. They eked out a living selling and repairing bicycles. But in 1949, their life took a turn for the better. The Triumph 650 Thunderbird came to town, and Verlon had the exclusive dealership. In short order, the rows of bicycles got shoved to one end of the showroom to make room for Triumphs. Life was good.

Verlon didn't really like working on those dirty, smelly motorcycles, so he hired my pal Hurtis. Hurtis was a wizard with a motorcycle engine and could turn the snarling, 100-mph T-bird into a screaming, tire-smoking crotch rocket. Kids and men, young and old, flocked to the shop to have their bikes breathed on by Hurtis. I don't think there was a single stock Triumph in town.

Around 1958 Verlon decided to semi-retire. He offered the shop to Hurtis. With a lot of help, Hurtis and I managed to buy it together. Eventually, we hired a couple more motorcycle mechanics. Verlon stayed on as the bicycle repairman. He kept a small workbench area for that purpose.

One day, we were all in the shop, doing our things. As the rest of us puttered on various Triumphs, Verlon was changing the rear tire on a Schwinn.

In the time-honored fashion, he loosened the rear axle nuts, removed the brake clamp, and tapped on the axle with a hammer to ease the wheel out of the frame. The wheel moved a bit, but then jammed. "Tap, tap" goes Verlon. The axle doesn't move. "TAP, TAP, TAP," goes Verlon. Still no joy.

Soon the taps became bangs, then harder bangs, then something else entirely. Picture this grizzled old man, on his knees on the concrete floor, wailing away at the poor customer's bike with all his might. "WHAM, BAM, @#@#R%$#, CRASH, @(*^!" goes Verlon. The air was turning blue, ionized by the intensity of his curses. By this time, the bike was half destroyed. The axle nuts were flattened. The axle was bent. The frame was full of dents. The customer was going to get a new bike.

Verlon didn't care. At this point, the battle was no longer about changing a tire. It was a matter of principle, and a battle of wills. That *(&@#% wheel was coming out of that @#%@#% frame, or he was going to know the reason why.

Finally, we couldn't stand it anymore. In unison, we cried "Verlon, what are you DOING???"

There followed this exchange.

Verlon: "Trying to get this @#@# wheel of this @#@# bike!"

Hurtis: "Loosen the nuts!"

"I did!"

"Loosen them more."

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"I don't have the wrench."

"Where is it?"

"It's up on the workbench."

"Well, GET UP AND GET IT!"

To which Verlon replies, "It's too much trouble."

Now that I'm over 65, I can appreciate Verlon's relunctance to get off the floor and stand up. But surely his judgement and common sense had been seriously impaired by his focus on the immediate problem. To the immediate task -- getting a wheel off a bike -- he had added a few unstated constraints: Get it off with this hammer, on this floor, without loosening the nuts any further. In time, the importance of these constraints had elevated to the point where reason had gone out the window.

We can all laugh at Verlon, as we did at the time. But how often do we let ourselves do equally stupid things, because doing them right is "too much trouble."