Tales from my misspent youth

I grew up the with two grandfathers, both worked on their vehicles, and one was a WWII airplane mechanic. I would sit on the fender and hand them tools from a very young age and sometimes get to turn the wrenches.

One of my uncles was a bootlegger with a trick 1967 Pontiac GTO with all kinds of switches -one would turn off the brake lights, another would dump the exhaust, and ther ewere others that I don't remember the functions of. Another uncle worked as a mechanic as a second job. He had a 1970 GTO, and my dad had a 1971 GTO as the first car of his that I remember. After that he had a Hurst Olds 442 Convertible he used to race -to my 4 year old glee.

On the other side of my family, my great uncle was a legislator and a cop, who was sent to Liberia to organize the civil police forces. He was assinated when I was 2 years old, & my great-aunt took over his seat after he was killed, and as a result I grew up with threats against my family for both anti-mafia work, and for civil rights work. We had bomb sniffing dogs, surveillance from time to time, -the whole nine yards.

I learned from a very young age, on both sides of my family how to drive and evade. I was running go karts at age 8, and had a motorcycle at age 14.

When I went away to university, I had a 1977 F-150 SWB Fleetside with a buit 351M in addition to a 1981 Ford Mustang I'd bought after graduation. My dad rolled the truck in a blizzard when I was 17, and I rebuilt the truck & brought it back from the dead. The truck would regularly beat Corvettes on the "boulevard," back when cruising was still legal. Car and Driver did a write up on the cruising scene in my hometown, and Hot Rod did several features of the cars of my hometown.

I remember cruisin' though the Boulevard one night blaring David Lee Roth's "Yankee Rose," I'd just pulled in to the parking lot when a girl driving another car, screamed -"I love David Lee Roth!" and opened up her blouse and flashed me with a very nice view of her, er, god-given beauties.

Needless to say, I loved David Lee Roth after that . . .

Back then, my hometown was still a manufacturing hub, and folks had good payin' jobs, and the city had over 100,000 folks. Families still lived on a single income earner, and most folks had the spare time to engage in cars as a hobby.

Nowadays, it's pretty rare, and the city's lost a quarter of the population. The Santa Fe shops closed, along with several other factories. No one has the machines in their basements anymore to do any fabrication. My grandparents could pretty much build anything with all the machines in their garages.

Cruisin' is now illegal, and the boulevard is dead Friday & Saturday nights.

Anyway.

Getting back to tales from my wayward youth . . .

I was returnin' to the University after working on the weekend for my dad's business. It was 6 AM and there wasn't a soul on the road. The speed limit was still 55mph at that time. I was going 60 mph when I noticed a cop just on the outskirts of town. I slowed to 55, and traveled the 45 miles to the University when I was stopped by the cop who'd apparently clocked my some 45 miles back -Just before the turn-off to the city where the University was located.

If I hadn't slowed down, I would never have gotten the ticket.

Shortly thereafter, I received a notice from my insurance company that my rates were doubling to $250 a month. This was 20 years ago, so in today's dollars, it would be somewhere around $400 a month.

My insurance was higher than a new car payment back then, -for a 10 year old truck. It had already gone up to $150 when my insurance agent's son told him about my truck, & my peeling out of the school parking lot lighting up all 4 wheels.

After that bit of racketeering, I vowed never to get another speeding ticket until I turned 25.

Keep in mind that I also grew up with a steady diet of the "Dukes of Hazzard," "Smokey and the Bandit," and the song "I Can't Drive 55" was still hot. So you can probably guess where this little memoir is going . . .

Not long after I started my freshman year, I got rid of the 1981 Mustang (turns out it was made of three stolen cars, and the dealer had investigations on him a mile long) and picked up a 1968 Mustang coupe for $1750. We replaced the engine & transmission, and it was good to go. (After I was done with it, some guy from Chicago offered me $12,000 on the spot for it in the parking lot of an auto show).

I was driving back to my home town along with a 19701(1?) pink Monte Carlo, named Pink Panther that was owned by another student at the University I was attending.

We had just pulled out of Shoney's for burgers and had merged on the highway when I saw something shooting toward us in the rear view mirror.

I was curious as to what it could possibly be, traveling at that rate of speed, so I floored it -Just to see how fast it was going, you understand.

The car was a sparkling new Porsche 928, and he was going 75 mph. The driver was wearing an "I drive a Jaguar" cap, driving gloves with the little holes for the knuckles, and aviator sunglasses. The car BACK THEN cost $125,000.

I couldn't resist, so I fell behind him, figuring if anyone here was going to get a ticket it would be the lead driver -especially one in a Porsche. The Pink Panther settled in behind me.

Then I saw the driver smile in his rear view mirror, and two puffs of smoke came from the exhausts. Knowing he'd just downshifted, I did the same and floored it. The Pink Panther was also game.

We were now doing 85 mph, and puff.

He'd downshifted again.

So did we.

We were up to 95 mph.

Then 100, 105, 110, 120 and I ran out of speedometer.

The car sounded like a freight train, and my already old weather stripping couldn't seal the windows. The Pink Panther was still bringing up the rear, when I decided to pass the 928.

Just to make a point, I grabbed a handful of fries, and started chewing them as I passed the 928, briefly waving at the driver & passed. The guys knuckles were now white, and his face flushed.

The Pink Panther passed him as well. We were putting some distance on the 928 when I saw a speck on the horizon of the city. The "I drive a $125,000 Porsche dude," with the aviators & driving gloves had just been passed by two 20+ year old cars that had been bought with 2% of the money he'd payed for his car, and he was seriously ticked.

A helicopter.

I stepped on the brakes and started downshifting as fast as I possibly could. The Pink Panther started to pass me when I gave him the universal whirlybird sign. He nodded and started braking, too.

The 928 pulled alongside, slowed, flipped us both off, and then took off.

About 10 miles later, we saw the 928 with a helicopter overhead, surrounded by police cars.

We, of course, slowed down flipped him off and laughed all the way to the city . . .