I did it.
I assembled my own wheelbarrow. My very own. That is mine. That I can keep and use. I know this is silly. That I shouldn't be feeling like I've achieved some major milestone in life because I own a wheelbarrow.
But I've always wanted to own my own wheelbarrow. And now I do.
I didn't even know I wanted one this much until I received the one I asked for on Father's Day. I can wheelbarrow around the yard now. I don't have to take five-gallon buckets around the yard, I can move stuff in 6 cubic feet of uniwheeled bliss. that's almost 50 gallons of stuff, people. I did the math. (Well. Siri did, anyway.)
Purchasing a wheelbarrow is fraught
You'd think that buying a wheelbarrow would be easy, wouldn't you? Well, let me tell you, it is not. Do you think you could do better? Tell me, then, off the top of your head, where you would get your wheelbarrow. Home Depot!? What are you a fascist? You probably eat that bullshit chicken sandwich, too. Gross.
Danger No. 1: Issues of scale.
No, if you're a good person, buying a wheelbarrow is 100% fraught with difficulties. Let’s start with this one on Amazon.com.
What's wrong with this wheelbarrel you ask? For less than $100, you can have this EVANEM wheelbarrow made of durable wood and plastic. it is also something you can use to HAVE FUN WHILE BUILDING SKILLS. But those are not the real problem with this wheelbarrow. The real problem with this wheelbarrow isn't that it's a unisex adult wheelbarrel, or that it, allegedly, has two wheels--- even though I can only see one. The real problem with this wheelbarrow is that it has a capacity of approximately .071 cubic feet. That's roughly half a gallon. That means, I'm guessing, that this wheelbarrow is at best, the size of a milk jug cut in half the long way.
Danger No. 2: Wheelbarrel death traps
I went to a semi-local chain store that sells items for both your farm and your fleet, but because I was nearby I did not go to the one I usually go to. And they had several choices, but none of them were on display. No big deal, I picked out the one I want on the kiosk. They had 25 of them. I bought and paid for it. I Everyone I talked to about it along the way reminded me to go and pick it up from the yard. I already knew that because I understand how stores work, but Ok. I appreciate the high-touch service.
And then I pulled into the yard. And the man in the box who keeps the yard free of enemies asked me what I wanted. I showed him my receipt, and he said I should hold on. He walked just out of my hearing range, where he had a conversation that I assume went something like this:
El Yardo Caminio: "This guy wants a wheelbarrow."Radio Guy: Pulls a huge bong rip. "Oh shit. Aren't there a bunch of them right near you?"El Yardo Camino: "I don't know."Radio Guy: You don't know? Ok.... Um... have him pull all the way up to the back.El Yardo Camino tells me that I should pull up to the back. So I dutifully drive up to the back. And I see a stack of rusted, rotten, damaged wheelbarrows, cracked open wheelbarrow parts, spilled wheelbarrow assembly kits, and damaged bins.
I get out of the car and start looking at them, and learn that none of the wheelbarrows are easily identifiable as the one I have purchased, so I have to wait for what comes next. It is at this point that I realize that I have no idea what comes next, as Yardo Camino offered no further instructions beyond going over there.
This is a tough moment in the retail experience. I don't want to come off as needy-- but there is no one around and no obvious next step. And, frankly, the store has my money... they don't really have any obligation to me to deliver the product now or possibly ever. I get it, I worked in retail long enough to recognize when you are caught up in a "nobody is in charge of this so it never gets done" situation.
After an emotional journey of 12 or so minutes, a man who looks more like Seth Rogan than he has any right to finally flies up to me on a forklift and says, "I think the wheelbarrows are all up front."
"What are these?" I ask him.
"Oh," he says. "I guess those are wheelbarrows."
We look each other in the eyes and both take turns waiting for the next move. I finally give in. "Are any of those the ones I bought?"
He hops off the forklift and says, "I dunno. Maybe." He starts poking at the pile of wheelbarrow parts and mumbling about UPC codes-- and finally says, "Nope. I don't think they are. "
"Ok," I say. and we're back to waiting for one of us to make the next move.
This time, he gives in. "The pre-assembled wheelbarrows are all by the front area, where you came in. "
"I did not buy a pre-assembled wheelbarrow," I say.
"They're all the same, though," he chuckles.
I step away for a second. I think I'm beaten. And then, like a beacon from heaven, a light shines down and I spot a wrapped pallet of wheelbarrows up on the top of a storage gondola.
"What about those?" I say, gesturing.
"Those are wheelbarrows," he says. Then a beat or two go buy and he realizes that I am actually asking him if he would get them down.
He eventually drives the forklift over to them, which requires he smashes his way through about a dozen plastic corrugated drainage pipes. There are two pallets of wheelbarrows stacked on top of one another on a shelf about 15 feet off the ground. He starts by trying to lift them both, but because of the drainage pipes, he can't get the right leverage or get his lift all the way under the pallet.
I am muttering a mantra of "this is not my job" repeatedly to keep me from offering help to the boy. I am convinced he is going to pull the pallet down on top of himself.
Finally, he stops, backs the forklift all the way back to me, and tells me, in a fairly polite way, that he is giving up and best of luck.
I do ask him for my receipt, and he does return it to me, seeming to remember that he was holding it at the moment I suggested he return it.
I go inside and enjoy a 10-minute conversation with the returns desk about how the boys in the yard are not really killin' it and there's only 90 minutes left until they can close and all go home.
Danger No. 3: what is a Wheelbarrow anyway?
I don’t think people really know what a wheelbarrow is. I mean, that's probably not true. And yet, as I was using a rogue AI to generate some images for this article, I came to the conclusion that the concept of "wheelbarrow" is, apparently, more fluid than I had anticipated. Enjoy this small gallery of failed AI illustrations for variations on the phrase "dangerous stack of wheelbarrows."
