Tinkers

Shortly after the family trip to Taiwan, I packed my suitcase and headed for an investigator meeting in Seoul. No one will mistake a business trip with a family journey. I didn't, at least not knowingly.

Before boarding the flight to Taiwan one week ago, I came across Paul Harding's novel, Tinkers, at the airport bookshop. I thought of buying it but decided not to. I made a reservation from our public library system, now that it can be done electronically by pressing few buttons.

And then I received a notification the book was ready for pick-up today, just before leaving for Seoul. It turns out that this Pulitzer Prize winner made a good read. In Tinkers, an old man lies dying from cancer and kidney failure over the course of eight days. This dying man, a repairer of clock, is drifting back in time to his recollections, the opposite of winding a clock. Like free radicals, his story unwinds in a chaotic manner, but with a passionate theme.

And as if that's not enough to convince me that the gears and cogs of experiences are intertwined, I watched the movie Hugo on the aeroplane. That's another story of tinker who takes care of the clocks.