Gumption (4 page)

Once my confusion is firmly established, I can then simply turn to one of the handy consumer channels we’ve been provided to tell us
what we think. Depending upon my leanings, I can flip on Colbert, Stewart, or the new hottie John Oliver, or conversely I can tune in to Rush Limbaugh or Bill O’Reilly or any other personality on the Fox News marquee. In any given circumstance, they will leave me no doubt whatsoever as to who is deserving of my vote and who is an asshole. Although I initially appreciated this convenience, much the same as I appreciated the Big Macs of my teenage years, I have come to wonder indeed, in both instances, what are the ingredients that go into the sandwich?

Without George Washington’s inaugural acumen for nonpartisan governance, I am convinced that we would be sunk even deeper in “policy” than we now find ourselves. It’s telling that the scholars all seem to agree that we have never seen another of his ilk in the White House and are not likely to going forward. At great personal cost, this excellent “first American” set our country sailing on as even a keel as he could manage, sails billowing, full speed ahead upon the winds of gumption.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

B
enjamin Franklin was never president of our country, and yet his likeness adorns the most substantial denomination of our paper currency in circulation, the one-hundred-dollar bill. I find it appropriate, by the way, that George Washington graces both the one-dollar bill (aka “bob,” “buck,” or “single”) and the quarter (aka “two bits”), as they have been the most hardworking and honest forms of currency in my lifetime. Many of my earliest wages were paid in quarters, which worked out just fine since I turned right around and funneled them into
Galaga
and
Joust
video game machines and then occasionally into washers and dryers at the Laundromat. In college, there was a perfect storm of a Laundromat that had washers, dryers, and
Galaga
, the allure of which kept me coming back with a frequency that kept my clothing smelling very pleasant indeed. Washington most likely would have approved of his likeness representing simple, honest lucre, as he was comfortable with his reputation as the go-to guy for all your cash needs, but James Madison would most certainly not have liked the fact that he landed upon the
five-thousand-dollar bill (which is no longer in circulation). The Mad Jam was not given to the fancier things in life, nor was he one to seek the spotlight, so such a display of his visage, while understandable to us, would have undoubtedly caused him consternation.

The hundred-dollar bill seems fitting for our man Benjamin, since he had the knack of pulling himself up by his bootstraps and engaging in admirably top-drawer activities, whether he was inventing some clever new innovation, seducing foreign powers with his skills of diplomacy, or disseminating wisdom and humor with his
Poor Richard’s Almanack
. (For these reasons and more, he is considered to be the father of American Freemasonry. In fact, he was instrumental in the initiation of George Washington into that secret society. This is all I am allowed to reveal.) I am powerfully enamored of Mr. Franklin for the achievements he crafted in his life, fueled primarily by an insatiable sense of curiosity.

As a boy, Ben Franklin loved to swim, and he was fascinated by the physics of the tangible world, that is, the way things operated chemically and mechanically, so he naturally invented flippers to help him swim more expeditiously. He found himself in a burgeoning new society, and he explored every avenue by which he might have a positive effect. He established the first library in Philadelphia; he established the US Postal Service, no big deal; and he touted reading above all other diversions. A lifestyle that I still consider to be the most attractive and profitable, if one can just avoid all the distractions of technology and other media channels. He was so devoted to reading as a pastime, he invented a reading chair equipped with a foot-powered fan as well as a handy ladder, so when the chair was flipped open, one could climb it to
reach a book on a high shelf. The man invented bifocals; he greatly improved the science of burning wood to heat one’s home by inventing the Franklin stove, which was exponentially more efficient than the popular open fireplaces of the day; and, of course, he famously discovered electricity and thereby the electric battery. Without this man and his creativity, our dildos would remain silent and lifeless to this day.

Now, as I have learned the hard way, accomplishing any achievement worth crediting in this life usually requires a few important missteps before one can discern the path to success. In my own case, naturally much less impressive than his, that means that I ruined a good deal of expensive white oak in joinery mistakes before finally succeeding in executing a respectable trestle table in the style of Gustav Stickley. If you were as profound and prolific an inventor as Benjamin Franklin, it only stood to reason that you would also invent some folly. My favorite example of this would have to be Franklin’s “air bath.” This technique entailed sitting completely naked in a room with all its windows thrown open, so that a person could “bathe in the pure, fresh air.” Before I too readily enjoyed a chuckle at the expense of this idea, I thought I had better try it out for myself. While I did find the experience to be enervating and even slightly titillating, I couldn’t in all honesty say that I felt any cleaner after thirty minutes of air bathing. I’m glad I tried it, although I can’t say the same for the rest of the people at the coffee shop. Personal experience is the surest method by which one can determine the truth of a supposition, no matter how reputable the reporter, since so many experiences are subject to individual proclivities.

A lifetime of deep thinking and subsequent tinkering was fostered partially by Franklin’s father, who would take him on walks around
the Boston of his boyhood, to witness “joiners [carpenters], bricklayers, [wood] turners, braziers [brass workers], etc. at their work.” Franklin stated that ever since then, it had been a pleasure to see good workmen handle their tools and that he had learned enough to allow him to construct little machines for his experiments. This episode moved me, as I had a similar but less intentional experience with my own dad. Among him and my uncles and grandfathers, not to mention our neighbors, I witnessed, and even got to take part in, carpentry, paving, roofing, gardening, animal husbandry, sewing, painting, boating, and mechanical work on engines large and small. None of these trades struck me particularly on their own, but I was quickly enthralled by the world of tools and materials and, most important, hardware.

Trips to Mel Phillips’s True Value Hardware in Minooka bore the savory fruit of working-class camaraderie in addition to row after row of magical implements with which one might plumb running water into one’s home or wire electricity to one’s tree house. There was real wizardry in those mom-and-pop hardware stores, delivered with a personal, avuncular touch and a free cup of coffee. Not every youngster is going to end up a woodworker, but some trips to the hardware store or a craft fair might go far in igniting a creative spark in your own little Ben or Betty Franklin. Many of Franklin’s projects were contrived by simply walking down the sidewalk or sitting at a café, observing the man-made systems around him. He noticed that the oil-burning streetlights would rapidly grow dark with accumulated soot, so he invented a new design with improved airflow, then added more streetlights and night watchmen to make the Philadelphia streets safer at night.

His desire to devise implements by which our lives would be improved was bolstered by his interest in what he called his list of “virtues.” Much like his younger friend George Washington, Franklin wrote out a list of the ethical ideals to which he hoped to measure up. They were temperance, silence, order, resolution, frugality, industry, sincerity, justice, moderation, cleanliness, tranquility, chastity, and humility. Franklin began to keep a tabulation of the instances in which he would transgress these virtues, and he said he was “surprised to find myself so much fuller of faults than I had imagined; but I had the satisfaction of seeing them diminish.”

To me, this sort of self-evaluation is most inspiring, as I find it all too easy to waltz through life lazily maintaining a minimum display of decency, which must necessarily register to others as a mediocre effort. Just go ahead and read through that list once again, and if you’re anything like me, two or three (or six or seven) of the virtues will jump out as areas that might like a bit more attention. We’re human and therefore flawed by design, so it’s a test we can never ace, but as the man himself puts it, “I never arrived at the perfection I had been so ambitious of obtaining, but fell far short of it, yet I was, by the endeavor, a better and a happier man than I otherwise should have been if I had not attempted it.” The notion gives me comfort—that if I simply
pay attention
, then I should end up a better and happier man.

This introspection no doubt played an important role in fueling Benjamin Franklin’s most consistently sagacious and hilarious journal, entitled
Poor Richard’s Almanack.
Self-published for twenty-seven years, from 1732 to 1758, this periodical was loaded with a mix of sound advice and jocularity. Authoring famous adages like “Early to
bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise” brought to Franklin a level of celebrity heretofore unknown in the colonies. Considered the first American humorist, Franklin regaled his readership with a constant stream of raillery over the years, uproarious yet redolent of horse sense. Within his
Almanack
and without, he is credited with such gems as:

Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead.

The greatest monarch on the proudest throne, is oblig’d to sit upon his own arse.

He that falls in love with himself, will have no rivals.

He’s a fool that cannot conceal his wisdom.

Serving God is doing good to man, but praying is thought an easier service, and therefore more generally chosen.

There will be sleeping enough in the grave.

To wit, this last phrase seems an accurate depiction of Franklin’s own practice, as a neighbor described him to be nothing if not industrious: “For the industry of that Franklin is superior to anything I ever saw of the kind; I see him still at work when I go home from club, and he is at work again before his neighbors are out of bed.” Time after time I am reminded by my heroes, from Ben Franklin to my wife, Megan, that great achievements require more than just talent and skill and super-foxy good looks. If a person wants to succeed, he or she must work his or her cute little tail off.

Additionally, many of the subjects I chose for this book seem to prefer reading books to all other forms of diversion, which I
understand. Watching a television show or playing a few hands of euchre, or even indulging in a video game, can certainly be most enjoyable, and it surely passes the time. The catch is that those activities do little else than divert my attention, while a well-chosen book can actually concoct a stew of betterment within me. Whether I’m reading the excellent nonfiction of a John McPhee or an Elizabeth Gilbert or the narrative stories of a Donna Tartt or a Patrick O’Brian, I have cultivated the opinion that a certain alchemy occurs up in my math-can that is unmatched in its potency by any other form of recreation. This is why I always prefer the book to the movie; even if Peter Jackson has spent considerable millions embroidering the astonishingly real world of Middle-earth, it cannot compare in verisimilitude to the Shire I imagine within my own cerebral laboratory.

In the Philadelphia library that he had established, Benjamin Franklin spent “an hour or two each day, and thus repar’d in some degree the loss of the learned education my father once intended for me. Reading was the only amusement I allow’d myself. I spent no time in taverns, games, or frolicks of any kind.” Now, I know what you’re thinking: Isn’t this the guy who said, “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy”? Well, not exactly. This quote has been somewhat paraphrased and hijacked by many of our nation’s craft breweries, and rightly so. It may be revisionist writing, but I for one am okay with it. What Franklin did write was, “Behold the rain which descends from heaven upon our vineyards, there it enters the roots of the vines, to be changed into wine, a constant proof that God loves us, and loves to see us happy.” Beer, wine . . . come on. Six of one, etcetera. He also coined the euphemism for drunkenness
“Halfway to Concord,” which tickles me to no end. That, my friends, is fun with words.

I myself think that taverns, games, and especially frolicks are very important activities in which to engage as well, but in moderation. For every four nights in the library, I would like to feel I’ve earned one night in the tavern, or at least half a frolick, if Megan is up for it.

Despite the rather puritanical tone of his guidelines, Franklin was still a lot of fun. I mean
a
lot
of fun. I am heartened by his advice to set up an orderly, structured, and productive life, and then fuck around within that framework, ensuring that you engender mirth whilst remaining optimally productive. For Pete’s sake, he wrote a scientific letter to the Royal Academy of Arts of Brussels suggesting that research be undertaken to explore methods of improving the odor of human flatulence, a letter that later came to be entitled “Fart Proudly.” If there had been any question up to this point that Ben Franklin was my kind of guy, this one piece of writing would extinguish all doubt. I could well have been his muse, had we shared a more contemporary time line.

From his vast, golden canon of wise scribblings and witty sayings and treatises on both foreign policy and breaking wind, there are two sentiments that appeal to me above all others. The first could well serve to mirror the main theme of my own book, and it looks like this: “We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.” Franklin made this statement just before signing the Declaration of Independence, giving us a clear indication that (a) he was hilarious even in the face of such a momentous occasion, and (b) the assembled statesmen were not remotely all in accord with the document at hand.