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THE COMPLEMENTARY GARAGE

By Peter Murchie
Contact the author by e-mail at christopher.johnstone@ntlworld.com

Conventional garages, pah! For months now I had attended my local garage. Nothing but oily boiler-suits, jargon, and god-complexes! Something was wrong with my car and I needed answers. The indicators clicked repetitively, the horn was dysphonious and the windscreen kept misting up on cold days. Furthermore my life-partner, Boudicca complained of a “positively haunting odour” the morning after CAMRA meetings.

Once more I was on the forecourt unfolding fears, concerns and expectations to a spanner swiveller lately emerged from beneath my chronically fatigued vehicle. Despite my fascinating discourse, I just didn’t feel that he was hearing my pain. “It’s probably normal, Sir” he said.

The bactrian’s back lay asunder (I should know – I posess a dishadash and Arafat scarf.)! With a swish of lurid climbing trousers, a jangle of tribal jewellery, and a high pitched cry of “Well, it’s not normal for me.” I exuented left. I paused outside to regain my breath, having winded myself with a dramatic, both fists to the heart manoeuvre, then drove home, the slipping of my sandals on the pedals (that was another thing!) heightening my ire.

Arrived home, I fed the llama, fetched some peats and retreated to my Rozenfeld chamber to re-energise. Relaxing in the invisible colloidal vapours, I sipped a glass of peppered reiki and listened to the thrum of my moxibustion poles re-aligning.

“Watsu, watsu….Quentin.” Boudicca interrupted my reverie. I suppressed my irritation - I don’t like to tangle with Boudicca, she’s a black belt in Shiatsu. “In here my love” I called.

“Don’t be too long will you, Quenty dear” she implored, knocking thrice upon the chamber’s hatch. “Ahhhhhh!!!!” I screamed as thunderous reverberations echoed through my copper sanctuary. “Oh sorry, darling” said Boudicca empathetically.

I climbed out of the chamber, emerging blinking and electrodermally stimulated. Boudicca, colourfully saronged, handed me a castor oil and tabasco. “Qi Jong” I exclaimed, sighting the Grudian health supplement and organic parsnips on the kitchen table.

Returned from the eco-lavvyTM , I replaced the breathing apparatus behind the door. We then shared narratives. I recounted dysfunctional transactions with uncaring conventional mechanics. Boudicca nodded understandingly. “You can’t blame then” she assured me. “The training, it constrains them. The car as machine, all interconnected parts and rational explanations”, she shook her head. She leapt to her feet and cried “they know nothing of the mysterious forces and energies.” Her smile beatified as she and the folds of her ironical fluorescent burka settled. “You need to visit Ian” she said.

I was excited next morning. After some scrambled quorn and apricot rashers I aligned my crystals and commenced Tai Chi. Unfortunately, I tripped over my Kaftan doing “crouching leopard.” but immediately recovered into “dew heavy daisy.” Rolf me, that was close!

I headed for Ian’s Alternative Garage, the car alive with radionic dsyharmony. “Not for much longer” I chortled.

Gazing at the inexplicably expensive façade of IAG my inner peace grew. I entered a fragrant waiting room. I admired the lush bamboo plants and the racy eastern mystics calendar. Soothing sitar music played in the background, a comic number by the Three Doshas.

A tall man with long white beard and pristine white boiler suit appeared. “Please sit down my friend” he intoned, proffering a wicker chair. “I’m Ian.” He offered a spotless hand. I sat. He gazed at me intently for several minutes, hands clasped prayerfully before him. Then he spoke, in deep sonorous tones, “How can we help one another, my friend.”

I probed queried and clarified. I referred to printed web pages. Ian was not a “conventional” mechanic, but did “work alongside” them. That was two bilateral index and long finger waves already – I liked the cut of his (presumably natural fibre) jib. By the time Ian had finished I counted four intense stares, three knee brushes, and six beatific smiles. His index and longs conducted me to a state of blissful trust. I had never heard of “the Institute” or “the teacher” but both sounded faintly Nepalese so I was well satisfied. Besides, I didn’t wish to appear sceptical. The healing began.

First, my narrative. I chronicled, Ian danced, humming and plunging his hands and beard in and out of my aura. Then I drove into the autopractic zone as Ian fetched the tubular field probe, a curious 20 inch long silver tool. I switched on the engine and sat back. Multi-coloured ginofraxic spotlights began playing over us as Ian whirled wildly around on one leg, blowing furiously into the probe and producing a screeching discordant cacophony, the volume reaching crescendo as he passed through the diagenetiogorical pole. At one point I had an inexplicable and horrifying flashback to 1977 and the Glasgow Apollo.

Suddenly, Ian fell limply to the floor looking like a man in dire need of craniosacral therapy. I leapt from the driver’s seat and rushed to his side. Ian’s trance continued. I waited. I waited. I feared that now he was beyond even advanced cupping. In desperation I tickled the corpus-callosum miti-zonal area of his left great toe (3cm distal to the mediodistal pancreatical fold), leaping clear of the upsurging ipsilateral testicle. Suddenly but expectedly, his eyes flickered open. I looked at him expectantly. “It’s yer carburettor, mate” he pronounced in a demonic and grating bass.

One hour later, Ian had sprinkled powdered endangered species genitalia onto the offending carburettor. In addition, he recommended a fresh lettuce leaf applied daily to the bonnet. I also booked sixteen homeopathic screen-wash treatments and exhaust pipe irrigations. “You’re wisdom has grown, my friend” said Ian. If only I had come here months ago! I drove home ecstatic. Boudicca was in the front garden, magnificent in a Peruvian peasant’s poncho and stove-pipe hat.

“Well….?” She smiled knowingly. I bounded up the path, setting the wind chimes all of a tinkle. “It’s fabulous, I just know the car is better” I squealed. “Even I feel better.” It was true. A great weight had lifted from my right hip, the wallet one.

Other hoolet online articles by Peter Murchie can be found at:
hoolet edition 49 - Sandyjim Saves the Day
hoolet edition 48 - And The Winner Is...
hoolet edition 47 - A Christmas Caper
hoolet edition 46 - The Edinburgh Festival
hoolet edition 45 - Struck By Enlightenment
hoolet edition 44 - The Pendleton Code
hoolet edition 43 - Christmas Eve at The Pole
hoolet edition 42 - An Unexpected Reunion
hoolet edition 41 - The Complementary Garage
hoolet edition 40- Up General Practice!!
hoolet edition 39- Ten Years From Now
hoolet edition 38 - Finlay and the Contract Summit
hoolet edition 37 - Johnny the Bow and the New Contract
hoolet edition 36 - Science For Football's Sake
hoolet edition 35 - Evidence-Based Golfing
hoolet edition 34 - Dr. Marlowe

hoolet is the magazine of RCGP Scotland. It is supported intellectually, financially and emotionally by RCGP Scotland.

This issue maintained by Robert Hallam.