I grew up in a city where everyone's father was an engineer working for the government and everyone's mom was a teacher. We didn't tell lawyer jokes because there were no lawyers (those were the days!), but we did tell engineer jokes. Everything you read about engineers in the Dilbert comic strips is true.
Anyway, I was just remembering a conversation I had with my Engineer Dad years ago. He was telling me about a problem he had solved and he seemed quite proud of himself. It went like this:
A guy Dad worked with mentioned that his son had tried to commit suicide the other day. He had driven his car into a brick wall as fast as it would go. But the car was an early '70s Ford LTD stationwagon and could not be destroyed by God or man or brick wall crashing. So the boy was bruised, but not dead. And the car was damaged, but still driveable.
The man was mystified at this odd event and turned to my father for advice.
Related side note: men do not tell men things like this as a matter of making small talk. Men tell other men things like this when they want advice. Women, on the other hand, talk about these things without wanting the least bit of input from anyone other than the sympathetic "oh my Lord, that's terrible" and a lot of listening with complete and full attention. Men who are engineers, in particular, cannot comprehend this oddity of women and will offer advice almost involuntarily, as if they can't control their problem-solving urges. When the women do not accept the advice and get irritated over the interruptions, the engineer-men begin to lose focus, finding that they cannot keep their attention tuned to any problem that they are not permitted to try to solve. This further aggravates the women, who then throw shoes at the engineer-men and call them bastards before divorcing them and shacking up with their personal trainer.
Getting back to the assignment of solving this man's problem with his suicidal son crashing his car into a brick wall - My Father and this man discussed the problem at great length and thought about it for a long while.
Finally, My Father came up with The Solution to the problem. He had once purchased a 1963 Plymouth Valiant for $200 for My Oldest Sister when she turned 16. The car had a push-button transmission with the controls on the dash and was generally a go-cart with a trunk. It was a fun little car, but wouldn't go any faster than about 50 mph. Being a Chrysler/Plymouth/Dodge product of the Pre-Bankruptcy Government Bailout Era it was completely indestructible, much like the man's son's Ford LTD stationwagon. But it had the added benefit of the inability to exceed 50 mph.
My Father had concluded that the solution to the problem of the crashing of the car into the brick wall was to buy the son a car just like that Plymouth Valiant, which was sturdy, reliable, and unable to go fast enough for anyone inside the car to be hurt in the event that it was driven at top speed into any brick walls.
The man agreed that My Father's solution was excellent and should solve the problem.
Now, even way back then when I was a kid listening to My Father tell of this great achievement it occurred to me that there was something slightly wrong with this whole thing. Perhaps it has occurred to you as well.
These 2 engineers had taken the problem of a boy attempting to kill himself by crashing his car into a wall and defined the problem like this:
Problem: Son crashes car into wall. Car and Son damaged, creating expensive repair bills.
Given: Car can propel Son fast enough to do harm.
Solution: Replace Car with slower, less expensive vehicle, thus preventing problem from reoccurring.
Ta DA!
I never heard if anything more came of this or not. My Father never mentioned it again, as I'm sure in his mind the issue was resolved and there was nothing more to do or say about it. I always wondered if the boy ever succeeded in his suicide attempts. If My Father, or any engineer for that matter, were the sort of person to accept input from others, I would have told him how I saw the problem. But since he wasn't I'll tell you.
My View of the Problem:
Problem: Son crashes car into wall in attempt to kill self.
Given: Father has no clue what is going on with Son and is avoiding confronting 'touchy-feely' issue.
Solution: Find out what is wrong with Son and try to help him through it before he finds your gun and uses that instead. This will likely require speaking to Son, followed by listening to Son's response. It is likely that special training will be required for Engineer Father in order to teach him listening skills beforehand. Wife will probably be enthusiastic about said training, too, which could be an added bonus, possibly in the form of sex.
You have read this article with the title The Engineer - part I. You can bookmark this page URL http://thebohemianbunny.blogspot.com/2005/04/the-engineer-part-i.html. Thanks!
