Poet Analyzes Life Through Kite Flying
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Tuesday, 3.12.13 ON THE WEB: www.yankton.net life PRESS DAKOTAN NEWS DEPARTMENT: [email protected] 5 Life In Poetry Riding Clutch Can’t Always Be Avoided BY TOM AND RAY MAGLIOZZI start using your clutch pedal to do light- Poet Analyzes Life King Features Syndicate weight, high-rep leg exercises. TOM: So Dad’s being a little over-zealous Dear Tom and Ray: here. Plus, sometimes you HAVE to push in My dad had a rule when we were growing the clutch when you’re taking a corner. Let’s Through Kite Flying up: “You can’t drive any car until you learn to say you’re in second gear and you’re making drive a stick shift.” I have two brothers who a left turn at a traffic light. He wants you to BY TED KOOSER had no problems learning, but boy did I give just stay in second and then accelerate out of U.S. POET LAUREATE my dad a run for his money on that one. I just the turn. had a heck of a time getting the feel for it, al- RAY: But what if leaving it in second gear This kite-flying poem caught me right up and sent me flying as though it didn’t help to have him screaming makes you go too fast through the turn? Or if soon as Robert Gibb described those dimestore kites furled tighter “CLUTCH! CLUTCH!” and turning red while traffic in front of you slows down? Then the than umbrellas, a perfect image. Gibb lives in Pennsylvania. the car was shaking and we were weaving right thing to do is push in the clutch. That around on country roads. Anyway, I finally allows you to slow down and control your KITES got it, and I actually really enjoy driving a CAR TALK speed, and then, when appropriate, either re- stick now, and I have never bought an auto- engage second gear or shift down into first. matic. My question is this: One of my dad’s Tom and Ray Magliozzi TOM: So your dad’s technically correct: Come March we’d find them many, many rules of driving is “Foot off the Every time you step on the clutch pedal, you In the five-and-dimes, clutch when you turn a corner.” And when that tend to wear out, Tesa. The one you are wearing out your clutch release bearing a Furled tighter than umbrellas he’s with me and I’m driving, every time my should be most concerned about is the little bit. Just like you’re wearing out your About their slats, the air foot is even near the clutch, my dad has to clutch disc, which is the “gripping surface” knee a little bit every time you walk. But is it In an undertow above us bark “Foot off the clutch, foot off the clutch!” that does the bulk of the work of transmitting worth worrying about, or yelling about? No. Like weather on the maps. I swear I hear it in my nightmares. I recently power from the engine to the transmission. ——— We’d play out lines moved back to my hometown, and my dad The way you can abuse the clutch disc and Which is cheaper, buying or leasing? Of kite string, tugging against said, “I don’t know what happened when you send it to an early grave is by riding the Should you keep a car forever or dump it The bucking sideways flights. left town — you were a perfectly good driver, clutch — which means spending too much after three years, before trouble starts? Find Readied for assembly, and now I have to re-teach you everything.” time with your foot in between “fully on” and out in Tom and Ray’s pamphlet “Should I Buy, I’d arc the tensed keel of balsa He claims that by leaving my foot off the “fully off” the clutch pedal. Lease, or Steal My Next Car?” Send $4.75 Into place against the crosspiece, clutch when taking turns, I will extend the life RAY: The other part that sometimes wears (check or money order) to Next Car, P.O. Box Feeling the paper snap of it. I think he’s full of it and likes to critique out is called the clutch release bearing, 536475, Orlando, FL 32853-6475. Taughtly as a sheet, then lift all aspects of my driving and find “faults.” which is a device that applies pressure in ——— The almost weightless body Please help! —Tesa order to separate the clutch plates. You use Get more Click and Clack in their new Up to where it hauled me TOM: Well, your dad technically is correct, that bearing every time you step on the book, “Ask Click and Clack: Answers from Car Trolling into the winds— but he needs to switch to decaf. clutch pedal. But it’s very difficult to abuse Talk.” Got a question about cars? Write to Knotted bows like vertebrae RAY: There are times when you simply your clutch release bearing unless you make Click and Clack in care of this newspaper, or Flashing among fields can’t avoid using the clutch when you’re a habit of sitting at stoplights for minutes on email them by visiting the Car Talk website at Of light. Why ruin it turning a corner. end with the clutch fully depressed. Or un- www.cartalk.com. By recalling the aftermaths? TOM: There are two parts of the clutch less you drop your gym membership and © 2013 by Tom and Ray Magliozzi and Doug Berman Kites gone down in tatters, Kites fraying like flotsam From the tops of the trees. SCHOLASTICS American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Founda- tion (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It FREEMAN ACADEMY Stephen Waltner Smith, Jacob Matthew Fields, Alex Edward is also supported by the Department of English at the University of 2nd Trimester Honor Roll: ——— Watts, Tanner Eugene Fitzsimmons, Brenna Colleen Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2012 by Robert Gibb from his 2012-2013 SCHOOL YEAR Freshmen Weinandt, Katelynn Jennifer Hedges, Haley Ann Ian Hofer most recent book of poems, Sheet Music, Autumn House Press, GOLD HONOR ROLL 3.60 - 4.00 Williams, Hannah Marie Hedges, Keeley Ann 2012. Poem reprinted by permission of Robert Gibb and Autumn Seventh Grade ——— ——— Hejna, Jordan Joseph Sophomores Grade 10 Johns, Mataya Katherine House Press. Introduction copyright © 2013 by The Poetry Founda- Ryan Brockmueller William Janssen tion. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United Annie Carlson Arens, Jaclyn Mary Johnson, Rhett Richard ——— Beckmann, Danielle Marie Megard, Logan Jacob States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Con- ——— Juniors gress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts. 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