Adventurer seeks tool’s rightful owner

Back in 2007, I was cruising the back roads, relaxed, letting my mind wander to the list of things I should have been doing instead of mindlessly poking around the countryside.

Something off in the distance caught my attention. It was moving toward me on the shoulder of the road so I prepared for evasive action. I was having a hard time figuring out what it was, lanky limbs flying all over the place.

Approaching the flailing critter, I realized it was human, a man walking at an incredible pace down the shoulder of the road using what looked like ski poles to enhance his gait. When I blew by him, all I could see of his face were the clenched teeth of dogged determination.

"Good for you!" I said out loud.

A week later I was driving the same road when off in the distance, here he comes, the pole-flailing walkaholic going about his business. He had the same look on his face, teeth and all.

The following weekend, I was on that stretch of highway yet again regaling the story of Mr. Determination to my car load of relatives. Then, as if on cue, I spotted him again, arms flying, teeth clenched. We all laughed and I got kudos for descriptive prowess. But the third appearance in as many trips? A bit spooky, but a commendable coincidence.

We've all experienced road coincidence, I suppose, kind of like a street light going on at the exact moment you're walking under it or driving by it. When I was a kid I couldn't believe how many people Dad knew when we were driving around. I figured just about everyone who drove knew each other.

Not much of that happens anymore, though. I drive around for weeks without spotting someone I can tap the horn at or flash a big wave signifying we absolutely must get together right there because we crossed paths at an intersection. No time, see ya later!

I was thinking about the run-ins with the toothy power-walker a few weeks later while running a couple of motorized errands. The guy on the radio mentioned it was the seventh day of the seventh month of the seventh year of the century. Since sevens and 11s have played an uncanny role in my years of roadtripping, I was suddenly interested in the squawk box.

I recalled a telephone call from Ken Langley, a former business partner, who told me his car's odometer flipped to 77,777 as he pulled up to work that morning. We laughed and yarned on about the time we moved our office in 1983. After four years in the big city, we had made a snap decision to relocate half way across the continent. By midnight we were unplugged and the corporate HQ was packed onto the back of Darth Vader, which was Ken's black-on-black Chevy pickup. Just as we settled onto the highway, a flash of sheet lightning lit the interior and there on the odometer it was: 77,777.

And now, here is this guy on the radio going on about the seventh day of July, 2007. For kicks, I calculated the 777th minute of the day would be at 12:57. And at precisely the instant I came to this amazing revelation, a tan Chevy pickup pulled out of a coffee shop parking lot right in front of me. Wait, something fell off the back. I blew the horn, waved and yelled, but the driver seemed more intent on getting at the large coffee he just scored.

So, I pulled over and picked it up: an almost-new handsaw. I thought about the dull, rusty relic in my own toolbox and smiled. Indeed, my ship had finally come in when Lady Luck dropped the sweet deal off the back of a pickup truck right in front of me.

"Hey Garry, keep it," I rationalized. "You did your best to alert the driver!"

I was quick to justify ownership of the handsaw. After all, someone might have driven over it and sliced open a new Pirelli or Michelin. I was doing society a favor by picking it up.

On the other hand, my good luck on the day of 7s turned out to be someone's misfortune and I felt sorry for the coffee-sipping dude who might have spent the weekend looking for his handsaw. He was probably building a deck for an anxious wife or maybe his kids had been deprived of the tree house Dad had promised.

Three years is enough guilt. Even though I enjoy the pleasures of possessing this fine tool, I'm ready to give it back to the rightful owner. So, if it's your saw, or if you know someone who wined about losing a handsaw from the back of his tan Chevy pickup a few years ago, let me know, because that toothy masterpiece is hanging in my garage.

Garry Sowerby, author of Sowerby's Road, Adventures of a Driven Mind, is a four-time Guinness World Record holder for long-distance driving. His exploits, good, bad and just plain harrowing, are the subject of World Odyssey, produced in conjunction with Wheelbase Media. You can send Garry a note online at www.wheelbase.ws/media using the contact link. Wheelbase Media is a worldwide provider of automotive news and features stories.