Chapter One
- Introduction - Drivers Ed.
Car 54 was a stock car. Actually, even in those days it was called a dirt track stock car and it was owned by three young guys: Tom, George, and Chris (me). The name, Car 54, started out as a joke. When we first went to the track with the car, we weren't even sure we'd finish any races, even the first one, and collectively as a group we had a slightly weird sense of humour. We reasoned that if we dropped out of a race, we could at least wave signs and banners saying 'Car 54, where are you?' like the punch line from the old tv program and perhaps give the spectators a laugh that way. We carried those darn signs to the track every week and had them in the pits all ready to wave each night. However, it wasn't until the last night of the racing season that they even got unfurled . . . but I'm getting ahead of myself.
For a start, I suppose I should introduce the three of us. The thing is that we've been buddies for so long that all of us seem to assume everyone we meet knows who we are, so I wasn't meaning to be rude. We'd been raised on farms within a mile or two of each other, so we'd gone to the same grade school and the same high school. By the time I graduated from Highschool it seemed to me that we'd been buddies forever.
Tom was sort of my cousin, I guess I'd better explain that, even if it involves dragging a skeleton out of the family closet. You see my father and Tom's father were the best of buddies, just like Tom and I grew up to be. My dad married Tom's dad's sister, Kate. Kate got pregnant with my older brother, Wil, but she had problems with the pregnancy and was bed ridden for months. Dad hired a housekeeper, cum nursemaid, to make life easier for everyone; she happened to be Kate's second cousin, Liz. When Wil was born, Kate developed problems and she only lived for a year and a half or so after Wil was born. Liz is my mother and I was born almost nine months to the day after Kate's funeral. You can do the math for yourself, and no, I am not a bastard son, by the time I was born, my Dad and Mom were married.
Anyway, back to Tom, since he was my buddy and my pal from the time we were in diapers. We played together, we learned together, and we fought with each other, but we shared almost everything. Lord help the person who wronged one of us; he had two fighting fiends on his hands. We were like brothers, but since we lived across the road and a few hundred yards apart, we didn't feel any sibling rivalry. As we grew up, Tom began to show a mechanical ability that used to astound me; he could take anything apart and put it back together again, well, almost anything, there was one time he goofed.
When I was twelve, I got a radio for my birthday and I made the mistake of lending it to him one weekend when my family went to the lake for a picnic. When we came back, Tom didn't come hurrying over to see me which surprised me a little. I was busy helping to unload the car anyway, but when we were almost done and I saw his mom, my Aunt Alice coming down our drive carrying a box and calling my name. I was surprised Tom wasn't with her. You guessed it. The box held all the bits and pieces of my brand-new radio. Aunt Alice was MAD! She wasn't angry with me, but she was ready to skin her youngest son alive. He'd taken apart my brand-new radio to see how it worked and hadn't been able to get it back together so it would work again.
Right about then, I wasn't too happy with him either. You see we had been trying to scratch a living out of our farm while going through a drought that had lasted for three years, I knew that Mom and Dad had scrimped and saved in order to buy me that radio because that was what I particularly wanted for my birthday. Even my older brother, Wil, and my little sister, Beth, had helped to earn the money to buy that radio; it had been a gift of love from my whole family, just like my brother's new bicycle and my sister's new hair brush and mirror set that each of them had gotten for their birthday's. I knew the radio couldn't be taken back and I knew that we didn't have the money to get it fixed and neither did Tom nor his folks. I don't remember it, but I guess I was fighting back tears as I carried that box of bits and pieces inside and set it on my dresser.
I was just furious. I think it was the angriest that I had ever been. I mopped around the house and barns the rest of the day, doing my chores mechanically, but not really having the heart to put any enthusiasm into it. After supper I was outside trying to get the hang of riding the bicycle that I had inherited from my older brother when he had gotten his new one. I saw Tom come out of his house and start to come my way, but I really didn't want to see him right then. Since I seemed to be getting the hang of riding that old bike, I rode off, peddling as hard as I was able to manage down the road and away from him.
I wove and I wobbled, but I was determined and I rode for quite a while before my legs started to hurt from the unaccustomed exercise in the muscles that riding a bike uses. When I finally gave up, I was about a mile from home, all the way down at the bridge that crossed the creek which ran along the west side of our farm. The farm on the other side had been owned by an old couple, but the old man of the couple had just died recently. We'd heard that his son was going to come live on the farm, but I hadn't met our new neighbours yet. When I stopped on the bridge, I was thinking I should turn around and go home. Just then I saw a guy about my age grinning up at me from the bank of the creek, below the bridge.
"Hi, I'm George Grant." He called up to me, "Are you Tom or Chris?"
"Unh, I'm Chris, how did you know my name?"
"Granny told me." He grinned. "We live here now and she said I might be able to chum around with you guys sometimes. I usta live in town, but when Grand-Dad passed away, Mom 'n' Dad 'n' I moved out here."
"I'm sorry about your Grand-Dad." I said, trying to be polite. Actually I'd always thought he was an old grouch and I had stayed away from this part of the creek because he lived close by.
"Yeah, he was okay, but for the last while, he was awful short tempered, I guess if you hurt all the time, you get that way."
"I guess." I was quickly deciding I liked this kid. I looked down at the water, feeling thirsty, but knew better than to drink the water from there. George's family had cattle and the barn runoff ran right into the creek. "I'm thirsty, but I guess I shouldn't drink the water from the creek, huh?"
"Naw, it's probably got cow dung in it and might make you sick, but Mom will give you something to drink if we go up to the house." He grinned. "Granny would like to see you anyway and so would Mom and Dad, I bet."
"Do you have a big family?" I asked, looking at their house and thinking it wasn't all that big.
"Naw, just Mom and Dad and me, along with Granny. Lucky too or I wouldn't have a bedroom to myself." He grinned. "I'm supposed to be a spoiled kid, 'cause I'm an 'only child', but Dad would tan my hide if I acted spoiled."
I had to laugh and realised that I was pretty well over my mad at Tom, besides I already knew I was making a new friend. When we got to the house, I leaned my bike against the porch steps while George pulled off his muddy shoes, then we traipsed inside. George's Mom and his Granny were washing up the supper dishes, but both of them were happy to see me. George's Mom happily poured both George and me a glass of milk.
"Where's Dad? I want him to meet Chris too." George asked, as he wiped the milk moustache from his upper lip and set the glass on the counter by the sink.
"Oh, he's out in the little shop fixing something." His mom smiled. "You go right ahead and take Chris out to meet him. He and Chris's dad used to be good friends."
"Well, aren't they still friends?" George asked, quite guilelessly.
"I imagine they are." His Granny laughed softly. "Even if they haven't seen much of each other in years."
"Oh! I get it." George grinned. "Come on Chris, Dad does neat stuff in his shop. He fixes all sorts'a stuff for people."
His dad's little shop was small, but it was packed full of neat stuff. There were clocks and radios and toasters and all sorts of other things stacked all over. The only relatively clear spot seemed to be on the bench right in front of the thin guy bending over and working on something.
"Dad?" George said quietly.
"Just a second son, I'm soldering a very fussy bit right now."
"Okay." George turned to me and held his finger to his mouth in a shushing gesture. I saw the gesture, but wasn't really paying much attention.
I had just realised that his dad was working on what looked like my radio. At least the empty case looked identical to mine, and when I looked around for it, sure enough, there was the empty cardboard box that Tom's mother had put it in, sitting beside him on the floor. I couldn't help myself; I had to see what he was doing. I moved forward so I could look past him as he soldered first one tiny piece in place and then another. He set the little soldering iron to one side on a special holder and sat back.
"There, that should . . . Well, Hello, you're not George." He laughed, finally looking at me.
"Nope, this is Chris." George snickered from behind me.
"And that's my radio, I think." I blurted out.
"It just might be." Mr. Grant laughed softly. "But I bet if we were to put it back in its case and plugged it in, it would work now. Would you like to see?"
"Would you? Please?" I said quietly, grinning like a Cheshire cat.
"Well . . . it's your radio, why don't you put it back in the case, I'll just show you how it goes, into the case that is, but only if you have trouble."
So with Mr. Grant's help, I fitted it back together and we plugged it in. It worked, but there was a buzz that hadn't been there before and he said that had to be fixed. Then he asked me if my folks knew where I was. When I told them that they probably didn't he asked George to go inside and ask his mother to phone mine to tell them where I was. He told him to tell them that he'd give me a ride home a bit later. Then he showed me what to do and guided me while I fixed my own radio. Oh man, did that ever feel good!
Later, Mr Grant helped me put my bike in the back of his pickup truck. He, his wife, and his mother hopped in the cab while George and I rode in the back with the bike and the radio. To be honest, I was holding that radio in my hands so it wouldn't bounce around too much. When we got back home, my family was sitting in the kitchen and Tom and his family were there too. After a few minutes, as everyone was introduced to the new family, I was busy. Then I was left standing with Tom and George off to one side.
"Look. I'm real sorry I busted your radio." Tom said sheepishly. "It may take a while but I'll give you my allowance until you have enough that you can get it fixed or get a new one."
"That's okay, I fixed it, but you owe Mr Grant for the parts." I snorted, lording it over him because, finally I had helped fix something he couldn't do.
"You fixed it? Does it really work again?" He looked at me with such a surprised look on his face as if there was no way I could fix something that he couldn't.
"Of course it does." George butted in, "Probably better than when it was new. My Dad wouldn't have let him take it out of the shop otherwise."
"He's right." I said quietly when I saw Tom start to bristle as if George should keep his nose out of 'our' business. "He had it mostly fixed when I got there, but it didn't work quite the way he wanted it to. So he had me take it apart and add a brand -new . . . I think he called it a . . . a capacitor?"
"That's what is was, I dunno what it does, but I know that's what it's called. I don't really care much either, just so your radio works again." George laughed, then I saw him get a thoughtful look in his eyes. "Although if Tom owes Dad . . . maybe I can talk Dad into letting him work off his debt by helping me with some of my chores."
Tom and I grinned at each other, we could understand someone who would think of that sort of thing.
So that was the night the 'treble trouble trio', as my younger sister, Beth, called us, first got together. Tom was the guy who could fix almost anything mechanical and was up to his elbows in grease and oil all the time. George was the salesman or politician of the group. He was one of those guys who said the right words to make people feel better, and I suppose he was sort of a jack of all trades. He could do lots of things decently, but he couldn't do anything outstandingly well. Me? I was the bookworm of the bunch, but from the day George's father had me help to repair that little radio, I was fascinated with electronics.
The three of us went everywhere we could as a group. Well, at school it was a bit different, I mean we rode the school bus together, but to start with I was a few months older than either of them. Since I'd known my alphabet and stuff at five, going on six, my folks decided to pull some strings. I had started school a year earlier than Tom and George had, which put them one grade back of me to start with. Then early on, I think in grade two, I had skipped ahead another year. It wasn't really surprising, I was going to a very small school and they often had two grades being taught in one class. The teacher soon caught onto the fact that I was not only doing my grade's work, but keeping up with the other one as well. When she talked to my parents, they thought I should advance if I could keep up. I wish they hadn't, I think that probably was one of the reasons that I'm so shy with women, even now.
Think about it. It's not surprising. Just look at the fall of the year I just mentioned. I was . . . twelve right? So normally, I guess if I'd been in a formal kid, I'd have been in what . . . grade six? Instead I think that year I started in grade eight. At any rate, almost the whole time I was going to school the girls in my class were two or three years older than I was, to them I was a little kid. Tom and George made friends with girls in their classes. I never really got a chance to even talk to girls my age, well except for on the school bus or the playground. So, I started out shy to begin with and I soon learned that girls who were two years older than I was didn't want some 'little kid' trying to get their attention.
Now don't get me wrong; I didn't hate school. For me, school was easy. I read a lot and I seemed to learn things easily, so I got good grades. Since my folks thought my grades were great, I put up with the jibs and the nicknames like 'the little professor' or 'the bookworm' and even 'teacher's pet' because they weren't worth fighting over.
Actually because of the teasing, I became even more of a bookworm. Books were safe; they never made you feel like a little kid or ridiculed you for being younger or smaller than everyone else. The only time I didn't have my nose in a book was when I was working around the farm, fiddling with bits and pieces of old radios, or mostly, chumming with Tom, or George, or both of them. When it was warm and if we didn't have any work to do on one the farms; we'd go skinny dipping in the creek, or riding our bikes, or playing catch, or just plain goofing off. We didn't know that since we didn't have a tv at home, we were supposed to be bored and have 'nothin' to do,' since we'd never known any different, we made our own fun.
Now, just because I read a lot doesn't mean I wasn't a tough little sucker. Shucks, you can't grow up on a farm and help out with farm work without growing a few muscles. You try heaving around bales of hay or use a pitchfork to clean out the barn and see if you don't grow some muscle. In addition with the rough and tumble of an older brother and two rough buddies, I learned how to fight. And we fought dirty when we fought, because we simply fought to win. Several times through school, I'd had to stand my ground with some town kid who thought he would impress his buds by pushing the little farm kid in the class around. After two or three times, most of the bullies got the message that when I fought with them, they got hurt. Then they'd get laughed at by my older brother, Wil, who was only one year ahead of me now. That probably hurt them worse than the sore nose or whatever physical injury that I'd given them.
By the time I was fifteen, I'd put on a growth spurt too, I'd reached the point where puberty had kicked in and it was driving me nuts. There I was, yearning to do something with girls, but so shy around them that they simply made me too uncomfortable to even talk. Even being around Tom's sister or sometimes even my own sister made me uncomfortable, so I spent almost no time around the house. Instead, I worked and I exercised, or I tried to dream up some way to make enough money to get a car. Having a car when I turned sixteen became the main objective in my life that year.
The summer after I turned fifteen, I made a deal with Dad. There were a couple of old Model-A Ford's rusting away behind some of our old farm sheds and I got him to agree that if I milked both cows, morning and night for two months, I could have those old cars and the use of one of the old sheds - provided I cleaned it out in my spare time. What that did was give Dad and my older brother time to go to work for the county clearing back the brush along the country roads. The money they made could go toward Wil's education at agricultural school. We'd pulled through those years of drought I'd mentioned, but the farm hadn't really gotten back onto a really sound footing yet, so that money was really needed. I didn't tell Tom and George about my deal right away though, but what I did do was get them to help me clean up that old shed whenever they had some free time. Then the day after my two months were up and dad made it official that the old cars were mine, I told my buddies that I had not one, but two old cars. You should have seen their eyes.
They were over in my shed, helping me work on making one running car out of two wrecks every chance they could get. We tore both cars pretty well to pieces and rebuilt one of them. Of course there were parts that were worn out and parts that were missing. However that year, we learned how to scrounge and how to modify a part we could get our hands on to use it to take the place of another part when we couldn't find a replacement for anything. I learned just how good a mechanic Tom really was and I also learned that George could sweet talk the crotchetiest old grump out of a prized hunk of junk that we needed to fix that car, and he'd get it for a pittance. Before the snow fell, we were driving that old clunker. That's when I found out I could make a car do things the other guys wouldn't even dream was possible.
We fiddled with that old car the rest of the fall and most of the winter, but the spring of my final year in school I turned sixteen and got my license. I drove to school almost every day with Tom or George taking turns riding shotgun and the other guy in the back seat. Of course the kids at school laughed and hooted about my old car, calling it a hunk of junk and trying to give me a rough time about it.
Well, they did until the day that Mr Dolens, the Ford dealer in town, saw that old car and followed us to school while driving a ten-year-old Ford sedan. There, in front of the usual crowd of jeering teenagers, he took the wind out of their sails by offering a straight trade right then and there for the car he was driving. I darn near took him up on it, but George caught my eye and gave his head an almost imperceptive shake. Somehow I managed to hold my tongue while I thought of what to say.
"Sorry, but I'd have to ask Dad first," was all I could think to say.
Tom nodded solemnly, "Yep, I think that's a good idea." He added quietly. "Dad was just saying the other day that you should advertise it in the city. That is if you ever do want to sell it."
"You get your dad to call me." Mr Dolens said, loud enough that almost all the kids heard him. "I'll match just about any offer for that car, I think it's one of the very first cars my Dad sold when he first got the Ford dealership and I'd like to own it."
I think at that moment, I was suddenly having the best morning of my life to that point and it was with our heads held darn high that Tom, George and I walked into school that day. The rest of the day I didn't mind hearing the whispers in the halls as I passed and even the girls in my class seemed to look at me differently. It was as if a switch had been thrown.
Almost any time rumours went through the school like wildfire, but that day I think the rumour about what Mr. Dolens had said to me had wings and walked through walls. The kids that had heard what Mr Dolens had said repeated it, but like most rumour mongers, they must have made it sound 'just a little bit better' when they told the next person. Of course the next person did the same thing. When I got home from school that day, I realised that the rumours had gotten a lot further than just around the school too. Mom and Dad were sitting at the kitchen table, waiting for me to come in.
"Well, it sounded like the old Model 'A' when you drove up, but what wild scheme have you managed to cook up now?" Dad looked at me with a grin.
"Yeah, it was the model 'A'." I managed to say, unable to hold back my own grin
"Aww, and I was looking forward to going to church in a new Lincoln." Mom chuckled.
"WHAT?" I broke into laughter.
I was still laughing a moment or two later when my little sister, Beth, came running in through the front door. "Chris? Where's your new car?" She was shouting at the top of her lungs. "I heard all about it at school today and . . . well, what's so funny?"
"What kind of car . . . did you hear . . . I got?" I gasped, through my belly laughs.
"Well, Dickie said he was there when Mr Dolens offered you the keys to almost any car he had, didn't you take him up on the deal?"
"Dickie . . . was the closest . . . to the truth . . . so far." I almost sobbed, now laughing so hard that my belly hurt.
"We figured the truth was a lot tamer than the phone calls we were getting." Dad chuckled. "So what did he offer you?"
"Well, he did offer to trade for a used car." I told them, "But I put him off by saying I had to talk to you first. He said he wanted you to call him before I made a deal to sell it to someone else."
"I see." Dad smiled, and something about that smile made me stand up taller. "What do Tom and George think? After all, they've put a lot of work into that car too."
"I thought of that, so I asked them about it." I smiled. "Both of them agree that it's my car, and while they'd like a newer car to run around in, they think it should be my decision what happens with it, but that I should listen to your advice. It's kinda nuts, but we've had so much fun getting that old car to run right that in a way I hate the idea of parting with it."
Dad just smiled. That night he had me call up Tom and George as well as both of their dads to invite them over for a coffee. I felt that the guys should get something out of any deal we made and Dad agreed with me. We must have talked for an hour. It was great. In the end, we decided that Dad and I would see if we could talk Mr Dolens into a deal where we would get one relatively decent used car for me and an older, not as well maintained car that would belong to all three of us. Tom's dad pointed out that we still had most of another Model-A back in 'my' shed as well and we could use that as a bargaining tool. We talked for a couple of hours and when everyone went home, Dad and I stood on the porch and wished them 'Good Night'.
As we turned to go inside, Dad put his hand on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze of approval; that mini-hug brought tears to my eyes and I went to bed feeling like a prince.
That Saturday, Dad and the three of us, Tom, George, and I, went in to talk to Mr Dolens. Remind me never to try to make a deal without Dad and George being along. We left there not only driving the car that Mr Dolens originally offered me, but with Dad driving another not so well maintained car behind us and behind that, Mr Dolens' son, Jerry, driving his tow truck and pulling another old clunker that we could use as parts. At the farm we helped him load up what was left of the other old Model 'A' to take back to his Dad. We heard later that Mr Dolens was ecstatic about the whole deal because he had managed to get his hands on two of the first cars that his dad had sold years ago. That surprised me until I talked to Dad about it. He explained that a good deal should always give some form of benefit to both sides of the transaction. Now that idea really made me think and I realized it made sense.
Anyway, for the rest of that Saturday after we got our new cars home and for almost all day on Sunday, Tom, George, and I worked on my new car. When we drove to school on Monday morning, it was cleaned and polished until it shone, it had been tuned up and it ran so quietly that as we pulled into the parking lot, all the kids stared. Actually one guy told me all he heard was the radio and we didn't even think we had that on loud. Let's just say that we got a lot of attention again and it actually made me uncomfortable.
In the next while I learned something about being the only guy who has something everyone else wants. The thing about having a car was that people seemed to automatically think that they should be able to get you to give them ride to other places. Now don't get me wrong, it's not that I minded giving people rides, it's just that it took gas and it took time. After a brief flurry of giving rides to guys . . . and girls . . . from the school, it got so all three of us tried to avoid promising anyone rides if we could.
Look, we were all healthy, strong young boys and our parents counted on us to work on the farm. We had chores that had to be done and if you've ever seen a cow that was used to being milked at five in the afternoon, she doesn't care one hoot that you are an hour late because you gave a pretty girl a ride home. That cow will have a full udder, which will make her feel uncomfortable, and she'll let the whole world know about it, loudly! We soon found out that our dad's didn't care to have that happen, so we tended to rush out of school on the run and hurry home.
I didn't mind much, but the guys were a little less enthusiastic about it. So to please them, I gave in, and on the weekends, if they each got a date, they'd find someone who would come along to 'chaperone' me. Even I knew that's what was up. Look, I think we went out on twenty or thirty 'dates' that spring, in that time, I got a hug or a tiny peck on the cheek perhaps eight or nine times. I actually got a real kiss on the lips once, on the night of my graduation. Even that was from a girl whose parents insisted that she had to be home a half hour after the last dance at the grad ceremonies and darn it, George and Tom weren't even along to witness that rare event. There I was, a high school grad, I had my own car, and my date had to be home by eleven thirty.
Actually, my being alone and driving down the main street of my hometown on my graduation night was probably another watershed moment in my life, at least a decision I made late that night led up to one.