To the editor,

My part-time gig at a local car dealership keeps me near the sights, sounds, and smells of auto repair which have been so familiar to me since tagging along with dad to his shop a half-century ago – only without the greasy hands and busted knuckles. One of my tasks, now, involves taking customers to home or work while their vehicles are under repair.

Since mid-January I have had multiple opportunities to shuttle one young customer to his home some 40 minutes away while our technicians solve a pesky service issue on his vehicle. We have gotten to know each other some; refreshingly, the 23-year old was content to lay aside his smartphone and chat with his 66-year-old driver. He was good-humored about folding his tall frame into a cramped space for the ride. We have even developed a standing joke since the day he instructed me to “make a left at the house with the ugly purple pick-up truck”.

The unmarried young man was initially full of talk about cars and trucks, but he also shared a little about his family and about his ambitions. He holds a skilled job at a company near his home, but has applied for a position as a first-responder in a big city nearby.

I perceived a dry sense of humor as he enjoyed my reaction to a small airplane that he pointed out lodged high up in a clump of trees along the way: a scrapped Cessna placed there as a gag by some folks he seemed to know. We had grown comfortable enough to talk a little about current events. Yep, I’d be pleased to count him as a son or nephew.

I thought of him as I studied Chris Occhione’s front-page photo in the March 11 Wall Street Journal of a young Ukrainian soldier in his open coffin – grieving parents by his side – killed in combat on the outskirts of Kiev. He had the misfortune of being born too close to a small, maniacal dictator with a big army and dark dreams of restoring an evil empire.

Even 5,200 miles apart, though, young men are, likely, not very different. Would he have enjoyed trading notes about cars and engines with my youthful acquaintance? Perhaps there was an “ugly” vehicle landmarking the pathway to his Ukrainian home. With every other reason to expect six or seven more decades, we are left to wonder where ambitions would have led him.

Defending his country, though, the young Ukrainian had his dreams, and life, snuffed out by Vladimir Putin – at only 23.

Even as we gripe at the latest price rise at the pump, finding a few extra bucks to send along to reputable folks engaged in Ukraine relief doesn’t seem like too much.

Douglas Smith

Rockingham