How to Putter
Through the ages, the average man cannot say he has fulfilled his destiny until he discovers the real reason he was put on this big, old Earth.
Avoid it though he might try to, the truth is he was sent here from another dimension to putter. But as he learns the art of puttering through his daily practice at it, he will come to love it as he realizes he is so naturally suited to it.
To putter is to come as close as a man can come to doing absolutely nothing while convincing anyone who might be watching him that he is actually doing something.
The Canadian government is responding to the severe shortage of putterers in our society by starting a training program for senior men to help them learn the art of just puttzin’ around. I wish they had come to me first as I am a well-known expert in puttering, admired for my skill far and wide, and have developed a 10-step program to teach these vital skills.
(Sorry young men and women of any age, but puttering is reserved for old guys. These guidelines will help to explain why.)
1. Never have a plan when you roll out of bed in the morning. A plan indicates you have a direction and to successfully putter, it is essential that a man has no idea from one moment to the next where he is going.
2. Do not seek to accomplish anything. This does not mean you are forbidden from achieving anything on any given day. Just that doing something worthwhile will never be your intention, more accidental than anything.
3. Make sure you never allow yourself to be drawn into a situation where you become busy. However, when asked if you are busy, always imply that you are. If the person wants to know what you are busy at, the correct answer is, “Well, you know …” The predictable reply will be, “I hear you. Lots to do. It never ends.”
4. Your entire life as an adult, almost without knowing it, you have been accumulating screwnails. Without exaggeration, you could start a very successful screwnail store. Call it, Get the Point, One Good Turn, Keep it Together. But keep in mind, to turn your attention to such a thing would require a plan which you cannot have. However, you can spend many satisfying afternoons sorting all your screwnails. Put them all into empty peanut butter jars and label them according to size and kind – deck, metal, concrete. You own at least 2,000 screwnails. From now till the end of time, you will only actually need and use upwards of 100 of them and 50 of those will be used to build shelves to hold all your screwnail jars. To a putterer, a thing does not have to make sense to make sense.
5. Your favourite day of the week will always be tomorrow. That is the day when all the little things around your castle that need fixing, will get fixed. What a wonderful day it is to look forward to. So many problems will be solved tomorrow.
6. Never make friends with other old guys who putter. To do so and to let your new friend see just exactly how idle you really are will lead to your helping to unload a truckload of lumber at your buddy putterer’s place down the street. Besides, putterers can be competitive. It is sad to see two old guys sitting in a backyard together competing to see who is more skilled at doing nothing.
7. Break up the few jobs you actually tackle into smaller tasks. If you see two nails sticking out of a board which could lead to a torn shirt or worse, sit down in a lawnchair and study both nails for a while. Then get up and hammer one of them completely in. Leave the other one for another date. Tomorrow would be ideal.
8. Sit. Keep sitting. Resist all temptations to stand. You spent your entire life running around. Climbing ladders. Walking on rooftops. Picking stones in farm fields. Driving tractors. Rounding up cattle. Teaching students. Painting houses. For the love of God, it’s time to sit down. And when you are done with that, sit down again. Your main concern from here till you permanently lie down, will be the availability and comfort of sitting devices – chairs, benches, logs, whatever. Avoid, however, sitting on the ground because getting back onto your feet from that position will require skills you might no longer possess. But twice a child, once a man, there is always crawling.
9. Wear a traditional farmer’s strawhat everywhere in public. Even in winter. The weirder strangers think you are, the more you will be left alone.
10. Whatever you are at this very moment, never change that. Never read self-help improvement lists such as this one. Or you could read it tomorrow.
©2023 Jim Hagarty
