Garage…Door Openers
I like to putter around the garage. I used to think that this was a sign of getting older, but I’m more convinced than ever that great things happen in garages. If you haven’t started puttering, it’s not too late.
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak started Apple in a garage. And the people who syndicated the Oprah Winfrey show started their concept in a garage. I have a good friend, right here in Indy, who started his multi-million-dollar candy business in his tiny garage.
There’s more: Jeff Bezos started packing books and shipping them from his garage in 1994. The Google search engine started in a garage. Even Walt Disney had a garage start-up.
I have never started anything in my garage. Well, I did start my 1978 Ford Pinto when it was only 35 degrees outside. I should get some points for that. And let’s see, I did start to clean the garage once. But I never finished, so I can’t take credit for that.
When you realize how many creative ideas originated in people’s garages and how much money has been generated, you wonder why parents still push the Kelly School of Business.
Where I went to college now costs almost $100,000 a semester You can get a really decent garage for about that. I spent a total of seven years in college and never had an idea worth more than a couple of bucks. My mistake? Living in the dorm, of course. When I first graduated from college in 1969, my dad said I could live at home, but only if I stayed in the garage. I blew all my money on an apartment. I should have listened to my father.
I have no recollection of reading about anyone who ever made an important discovery in a living room. And when’s the last time someone said to you, “You know, I just had the greatest idea while up in my attic”? And spare bedrooms? I don’t think a single earth-shattering accomplishment has ever come from a spare bedroom.
Even criminals love garages. When was the last time a killer planned his next murder in the sunroom? Or a bank robber mapped out his Brinks robbery on the screened-in porch? Garages just bring out the best in people.
I sat in my garage the other day reflecting on all the time I’ve spent in my lawn chair contemplating Plato, or in the bedroom listening to Mozart. All that wasted time when I could have been sitting on our snow blower thinking great thoughts. But it’s tough being so inspired…
“Stevie Jobs, what are you doing out in the garage?”
“Mom, sitting out here has given me an idea that could make us rich. We’ll take all this junk from the garage and sell it right in our driveway. People in the neighborhood will come buy stuff we were going to throw out. We’ll call it a garage sale.”
“Already been done, Stevie. Any other bright ideas? By the way, I swear, every time you and that Wozniak boy disappear in there, something in this house stops working. What are you two doing now?”
“Nothing, Mom. Just improving the future of human civilization. Oh, and we will be billionaires.”
“Stevie, you and your buddy better get out of the garage. Those fumes are getting to you guys.”
The more I think about this, the more I realize it’s time for me to accomplish something in the Wolfsie garage.
I need to find that broom.
