Vic Socotra

18 August 2009

The Way Things Work

(M1911 A1 Parts List, Exploded)

I had a little exercise in figuring out how things work the other day. Since my life has devolved into a series of counter-intuitive metaphors, I thought I would pass it along for what it is worth. Like volunteer labor, you get what you pay for.

Jiggs is going under the knife today. It is elective surgery, but while it has risk, the procedure may wind up saving his life. It is a version of the pay-me-now or pay-me-later thing, which is the way things work.

We were out shooting on Sunday, which was something to take his mind off things. I upgraded my personal pistol last year, but had not got around to actually learning how to use it. It is a thing of solemn elegance, all blue steel and rich rosewood grips.

It is a lightened version of the venerable M1911-A1 Colt .45 semi-automatic pistol, a single-action, semi-automatic, magazine-fed, recoil-operated pistol, chambered for the .45 ACP cartridge.

It was designed by the legendary John M. Browning along time ago in response to the Army's requirements for jungle warfare in the Philippines, 1898-1900. The old .38 pistol in the inventory then just did not have the power necessary to stop an oncoming Moro holy warrior.

I fed about fifty rounds down-range at Clark's outdoor range with the Colt, and was impressed by the jolt and noise. I shot straight, though a little low.

The Army left the Colt behind in 1985, moving to a more elegant 9mm Berretta, but events in the Sandbox and the mountains of Afghanistan have brought the heavier and more massive .45 back into a certain vogue. You can argue whether or not these things are necessary- that is another conversation altogether- but so long as it is my right to have them, I will.

I have always thought that way. I have had one of Browning’s more modern designs for years- his 9mm Hi-Power. John had sold the rights to his successful M1911 to Colt's Patent Firearms, and was therefore forced to design an entirely new pistol while working around the M1911 patents.

That was the essence of the problem; I thought that by understanding how one thing worked, I understood others that I did not.

We got back to Big Pink late in the afternoon and there was still sun on the pool. I thought I would break the gun down and clean it before throwing myself in the pool. Like the Congress, I wanted to be done with the chores and move on as quickly as possible.

How hard could it be? The Colt and the Browning look very much the same, as you would expect, and since I can take my Hi-Power apart in a minute or so, did exactly the same to the Colt.

Bad move. Very bad.

Nothing worked the same way. The spring was much more massive; the barrel did not emerge from the slide housing; there were a couple odd parts on the muzzle I had never seen before, and the light was fading as I looked helplessly at the pile of blue steel parts on the clean white towel in front of me.

I had no idea how it worked. I mean, I knew how things were supposed to work, but I did not know how this worked.

I had to go swim with the pile of parts still there on the dining table, accusing me.

It took a lot of research that night until I found a computer-aided graphic that showed all the parts flying apart and then back together in elegant slow motion. I watched it twice before wrapping up the pile of parts in the towel and taking it back to the back bedroom, so the pile of parts would not be there, reminding me of my ineptitude with the coffee.

I slept well but lightly, and in one dream the parts to the Colt flew magically through the air, just as they had on the computer screen.

Still in the twilight daze, the parts were there beckoning on the towel under the lamp on my bureau when I creaked out of the rack. The sky was just going gray out the window, and my hands worked on their own.

The barrel dropped into the slide from the muzzle end, the recoil spring guide dropped in below it. The slide slid smoothly into the grip, the holding pin slipped in and I got the safety lever to seat on the slide with a satisfying slick on the little piston spring.

The mainspring dropped nicely into the barrel and properly seated on the recoil spring guide. The barrel bushing dropped in nicely, seating at the 90-degree position and rotating to the 270-degree position to swing back and capture the recoil spring plug.

The plug is a little black steel tube that drops over the top of the spring, It has a little checkered design on the top, which enables the experienced operator to compress the surprisingly strong mainspring and twist the bushing into place and seat the mainspring with a satisfying click.

Of course, it did not do that in the gray darkness. My thumb slipped and the spring leapt out, launching the recoil spring plug off into the darkness. There was a sharp click as it impacted something in the middle distance, then silence.

There is an upside, of course. It could have been in my eye. Could have been in the bed, in the still-tangled covers. Could have been under it. Could have rocketed up to the top of the big white windowed cabinet. Could be in the corner under the bookcase. At least the window is closed, and I am reasonably sure it is still in the room and not in the pool.

I put the mostly assembled pistol down, the mainspring drooping sadly out of the muzzle.

That is also how things happen, I have discovered, if you do not know how things work. Even if you understand other things.

I asserted at the beginning of this that life is both real and metaphor. When it comes to politics, and politicians, they key to understanding what they do is to understand how things work. I understand that a lot better than I do the M1911 A-1, though I have learned a lot over the last couple days, on hands and knees, looking for that damned recoil spring plug.

That is pretty much the way the Administration is at the moment, looking for a way to put the cap on something that looks like healthcare reform.

It suddenly occurs to me that I was going to try to explain single-payer coverage today, and why David Axelrod, the very astute advisor to the President, said today that Mr. Obama has “absolutely not” concluded it to be impossible for a bill including a public plan to pass Congress.

They seem to be looking for their own recoil spring cap up there, and Mr. Axelrod said he expected discussions to resume in September.

That will give us all some time to cool off and think about what is being contemplated for our collective futures, and why we have to hurry and pass something without a great deal of contemplation.

That is the only way to make this unworkable thing work, after all, and that is why everything must be done at once.

There are those who think that is the way things work, and others who think it is the only way that things could be made to work, even if it doesn’t work that way.

We’ll see. In my case, I am treating the bedroom as a crime scene until I find that little metal plug. It is the only way I can get the Colt to work. We may want to do that with health care reform, but you figure the odds on that one.

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