There's a Porsche in our driveway. How rarefied is that? Well...not really. It's a 1981 928 model that Buddy traded some automotive stereo equipment for. If you like cars it's a diamond in the rough, an unpolished gem, a work in progress. If you aren't a car buff it's a couple of tons of scrap metal taking up valuable real estate. I guess I'm kind of in the middle on this. I can see the light in Buddy's eyes, the plans and dreams of making something of value from this working, yet needy, piece of - I mean, slice of sports car history.
As we stood admiring it together,while the boys crawled all over it, I couldn't help but harken back many years to Buddy's 16th year. He'd been learning body work in auto class and I had the bright idea of buying him a junk car that he could play around with and learn about cars. For a couple hundred bucks we pushed an old and not so mobile Volkswagen Beetle into the back of the garage, hung some cheesecake girlie pictures on the wall along with a few tools and called it his office.
There she sat, Gozer, as she affectionately came to be known, for the next 3 years (or was it 5, or a hundred?) without so much as a fresh sandpaper mark on her dented rusty brown rump. The most use she got was bearing Buddy's weight in the front seat when he went out for a smoke or to listen to the radio. I don't think he even took the crap off the back seat by the time we finally had it hauled away.
So here we are again, figuring out how to fit the new Gozer the Gozerian into the garage. This one actually drives, will pass inspection and, to be fair, has some real value - in parts if nothing else. But if any of that will be realized remains to be seen. Over the ensuing years our driveway has been host to a number of Buddy's used cars. Some were sold, others traded. Sooner or later they all went. But this one strikes me as different. Maybe it's the twinkle in his eye at having a Porsche. Maybe it's the fact that it will run (at least for now) without needing a thousand dollars burned in sacrifice of her clutch or brakes or rotator cuff.
Yup, we may be sharing a berth with this baby for a long while. I guess everyone needs a hobby.
As we stood admiring it together,while the boys crawled all over it, I couldn't help but harken back many years to Buddy's 16th year. He'd been learning body work in auto class and I had the bright idea of buying him a junk car that he could play around with and learn about cars. For a couple hundred bucks we pushed an old and not so mobile Volkswagen Beetle into the back of the garage, hung some cheesecake girlie pictures on the wall along with a few tools and called it his office.
There she sat, Gozer, as she affectionately came to be known, for the next 3 years (or was it 5, or a hundred?) without so much as a fresh sandpaper mark on her dented rusty brown rump. The most use she got was bearing Buddy's weight in the front seat when he went out for a smoke or to listen to the radio. I don't think he even took the crap off the back seat by the time we finally had it hauled away.
So here we are again, figuring out how to fit the new Gozer the Gozerian into the garage. This one actually drives, will pass inspection and, to be fair, has some real value - in parts if nothing else. But if any of that will be realized remains to be seen. Over the ensuing years our driveway has been host to a number of Buddy's used cars. Some were sold, others traded. Sooner or later they all went. But this one strikes me as different. Maybe it's the twinkle in his eye at having a Porsche. Maybe it's the fact that it will run (at least for now) without needing a thousand dollars burned in sacrifice of her clutch or brakes or rotator cuff.
Yup, we may be sharing a berth with this baby for a long while. I guess everyone needs a hobby.