Much of my life has revolved around cars and trucks. My favorite toys were Tonka trucks and plastic crash cars. I remember rolling spring-loaded toy cars into the living room wall and squealing with joy as the toy crashed and exploded fenders, bumpers, and other assorted parts. I would collect all the components, reattach the fenders and repeat the process for hours on end. It was a wonder my parents ever allowed me to drive their cars later in life.
I still have no idea how my father Frank survived teaching me to drive. I am right/left hand challenged. My dad would instruct me, “turn right at the next corner,” and I would turn left. This was not a big deal driving in small town Lafayette or on the county road. When he took me to the big city of Boulder with one-way streets, it became a bit hair-raising. I also had trouble downshifting a manual transmission and braking at the same time. I once turned right on a gravel road at 30 MPH, drifted into the path of an oncoming car, fishtailed almost into the ditch, straightened out, finished my downshift and apologized to my dad, who probably needed a change of underwear at that point.
My dad spent a lot of time in our garage working on our car. Dad had converted an old mule barn into a small garage. If you owned a used car built in the ‘40s and ‘50s, you just expected to replace starters, engines and transmissions on a regular basis. Dad often would walk to work and leave the car for mom to use. I remember many dinner conversations starting with mom telling dad about a funny sound or hard starting problem with the car. My dad always responded with a disbelieving tone, “It shouldn’t do that!”
He would then go test drive the car. Of course, for him the car wouldn’t make the funny noise and behaved absolutely normal. He would sigh and proclaim the car “fine” and hand the keys back to her. Inevitably, two weeks later it would break down. Mom would put on her best “I told you so” look and go back to the dishes. I grew up just knowing that dad could fix anything. He passed this talent on to my brother who became a mechanic. That particular gene never got passed on to me. In fact, my high school job counselor told me I had no mechanical aptitude whatsoever. I have owned many old cars. We had Tracy’s old 1967 Triumph Spitfire, which we spent more money on repairs than we ever did on gas. My wife Tracy, has become very good at hearing ominous car sounds and is almost always right about the problem. Still… I can’t help myself from parroting my father. “It shouldn’t do that!”
By ED PECK | Special to the Herald Times
