Emasculation in a jiffy Nothing makes me feel less like a man than going for an oil change BY ALAN OLIFSON

EVERY 3000 miles, whether I need it or not, I am emasculated. Of course, the owner’s manual calls it an oil change.

It’s not the act of paying someone to do something I’m too lazy to do myself that I find so humiliating. I do that all the time — car washes, my cleaning lady, McDonald’s — and normally I’m more than happy to pass off my responsibilities to the lowest bidder. But that’s because I at least feel I could do them myself. In theory. And if I knew where I kept my sponges. The point is, I know enough about what’s involved to prevent being taken outright. My cleaning lady never calls me in the middle of the day to say, "Alan, I’ve noticed it’s been three months since I’ve hot-waxed and sealed your countertop. We could let it go another few weeks, but there’s a chance some ketchup could seep underneath the tiles, and then you’d need new cabinets. And obviously your toilet water needs to be refiltered. I can do both for an extra $89.99."

But with an oil change, I’m an easy mark. They’ve got me pegged from the moment I’m guided into the service bay and hesitate before remembering how to pop my hood. It is generally downhill from there. I wait helplessly in the unnaturally bright waiting room, drinking bad coffee, and desperately clinging to my soon-to-be-useless $17.99 coupon. Inevitably, the mechanic pops in his head and says — in that friendly yet self-satisfied tone people use when they know they can charge you $1000 to urinate on your tailpipe — "Mr. Olifson, I need to go over a few things with you." In all my years of oil changes, this has never been followed by a discussion of how clean I’ve kept my air filter.

The smug little engine-walk-through charade is the worst part of the whole ordeal. It’s as if they’re simultaneously telling me they’re going to rip me off and challenging me to stop them. "You know what your rear differential is, right? So you can see here that it obviously needs adjusting. And, of course, if you look here, you’ll see you need a radiator-fluid exchange." They’re not just betting I don’t know anything about my car — they’re betting that I will actually pretend to know something about my car. You could say the entire quick-lube business model is predicated on the hope that people are too proud to ask for clarification.

"Uh huh, sure, right," I always say.

And so my last $17.99 oil change cost me more than $100. Something apparently needed extra lubing. Don’t ask. Lord knows I didn’t.

The sad thing is, my car isn’t the only thing I rely on which I am unable to maintain myself. I am surrounded by things whose inner workings are a mystery to me — not even counting my girlfriend. My computer, my phone, my toaster. Turns out, I can’t fix anything I own. I live in the most technologically advanced civilization in history, yet I can’t even darn a sock.

People sometimes fantasize about what power they’d have if they could travel back in time, knowing what we know now. But if I were sent back to medieval times, I’d still be useless. Not only would I be unable to duplicate any modern technology, I’d be slow and awkward in my chain mail. As a visitor from the future, I would be a tremendous disappointment, having nothing to offer but constant complaints of "I’m cold, I’m hungry, I think I have the plague."

So I guess I can’t blame Jiffy Lube for emasculating me. It is but a symptom. The truth is, I am a dependent cog in this great civilization, relying on machines without bothering to understand their underlying principles. Everything I own may as well be powered by magic or little gnomes. In fact, I’d be better off if my car were powered by little gnomes. Then I could just feed them and give them words of encouragement. Spark plugs don’t respond much to a good pep talk.

It’s too late for me to rebel and go live "off the grid," to grow a beard and fend for myself somewhere in the wilds of Idaho or Montana. I’ve been declawed. I’d have as much chance of surviving in the wild as a freshly manicured poodle. And so I guess I’m destined to spend the occasional Sunday being enfeebled by mechanics. It’s the price I pay for modern living.

But I can at least take solace in knowing there is one piece of equipment no one knows better than I do — my own body. Except, well, I’m not exactly sure where my pancreas is. Or what it does. Or why it would make my pee burn. Not that my pee does burn. But if it did, I would suspect my pancreas. Which probably underscores how little I know about my own body. All this reminds me, it’s time for a physical. Damn it. Talk about emasculating. Nothing makes you feel like you’re not in charge of your own destiny more than the snap of a rubber glove. I just hope I don’t need my blood changed again. Now that’s expensive.

Send radiator-fluid-exchange tips to Alan Olifson at www.olifson.com