A LATE night fog slowed progress. I drove home from
a distant church meeting. Each time the fog rolled in I tried to use the high
beam headlights. The mist would glare back, so that only low beams would allow
me to wend my way. Occasionally, I could not see through the clouds at all. I
kept stepping on the brake, but the fog’s swirling made it look like the car
was still rolling right along. I opened the driver’s door and looked down. The
car had indeed stopped. Then rolling slowly forward with the door’s interior
light shining on the roadway’s double yellow line, I felt pressed. Remaining
there stopped in the road was not an option… for fear of another driver
crawling up behind me. I was tense in the darkness, but kept going. By the time
I could see and arrived at my hometown street it was close to midnight.
I rolled up my
street toward home and became aware that a glow highlighted a garage doorway in
a house located about three doors before my own. Knowing the gear head that
called the bi-level place his own, I knew that I’d likely find Nick beneath the
hood of his favorite project. Sure enough, the door to the garage was wide open.
Dressed in a
NASCAR tee-shirt and droopy jeans, Nick was draped over the engine housed
beneath the open hood. Plenteous fender covers protected the deep metallic blue
paint on his Mustang. Engulfed by the V-8 beneath the hood, he worked intently
on the ignition system.
The engine was
beautiful. Tasteful appointments of stock and aftermarket baubles accented two
chromed, custom rocker arm covers. A tricked out high-performance 4-bbl carb
nested nicely on top of a hi-rise aluminum manifold. I knew from previous
conversations that the manifold sat ever so lightly between cylinder heads that
had been ported, polished, relieved and tulip valve matched by Nick for maximum
air flow. He had built this engine over the period of a year, with countless
hours of exacting and painstaking work.
Indeed like the
rest of the car, most work in the engine was done personally by Nick. Several
years of late night hours had formed his gorgeous set of wheels, given as a
hand-me down Ford from his father. He had given the car to Nick while the boy
was in high school.
Out
of the Mist!
“Watcha doin,
Nick?” I asked.
Deeply
committed to the task, he didn’t even look up to see who it was.
Apparently
recognizing my voice, he said, “I just reworked the distributor. It had a bit
too much play in the shaft bushing, so I thought I’d do the whole job once
over. While in there, I re-curved the stock centrifugal advance and shimmed the
vacuum advance at the speed shop last week. Now I’m dropping the whole works
back in.”
Nick then
straightened up from the old couch cushion that supported him, keeping his
weight off the radiator housing. He wiped his hands with a shop towel, though
not a spot of dirt could be found anywhere in the engine bay.
A tall young
man in his late twenties, Nick looked eyeball-to-eyeball with me as he stood.
With a “Pfft”, he blew dark hair back from his brow and said, “Reverend, I had
to index and reseat the distributor to the oil pump drive rod again, so I
though it should get another shot of oil to the crank and bearings before I
fire up this old snake.”
I nodded,
knowing that using an electric drill and a home-made adapter rod, Nick could
work the pump until engine oil pressure showed on the dash gauge. I also coldly
noted his rather official “Reverend” reference to me as his neighbor, and the
pet name “snake” as he spoke about his project car. Though in the past he said
that he knew the car wasn’t a “Cobra”, he treated the Mustang like he was a
fluted hypnotist entreating his king snake into a wheel stand. I wondered many
a time about whether he was the one being hypnotized. Often, on late summer
nights, it seems the snake played the flute.
“How are Jennie
and the kids?” I asked quietly, thinking that I’d better keep our voices low or
I’d awaken the sleeping home.
“They’re okay I
guess. Jennie has the girls with her down to her parents in Atlanta. I haven’t talked to
them for a while.”
“Oh, when did
they go?” I queried.
He wiped the
bent wrench especially angle-made for tightening the Ford engine’s distributor
clamp bolt. And without looking up from his task, he said… “They’ve been gone more
than a month” He paused a bit… “I don’t know when… or if they’ll come back.”
I thought for a
minute or two about what he said. Then I asked, “Is there a problem, Nick?”
He shrugged a
little. “Yeah.., I guess. Jennie says she’s going to stay there for a while.
She said I don’t spend enough time with her and the girls.”
He bent over
the engine again and started putting the distributor cap in place, turning it
slowly so to index it properly.
“I’m home all
the time. It’s not like I’m going out to a bar or clubbin’ or nothing like
that.” He then continued, “I’m always out here in the garage every night. She knew where
to find me.”
Usually
reluctant to comment casually on marital troubles, I stood trying to do what
every friend should do… just listen. But somehow.., what he’d told me was just
like that little lifter click people would sometimes hear beneath the forward
portion of the right valve cover on a 455cid V-8 Olds. Hearing it, I’d asked myself while
listening… is it just a bit of dirt, a bad lifter, a rocker, or is the whole
train starting to wobble?
So boldly I
asked… “Nick, when’s the last time you went anywhere on a date with your wife…
just the two of you?”
“I took her to
the movies over Thanksgiving.” he said.
“That’s many months
ago. And you both sat there watching the screen, I imagine.., not talking. Did
you go somewhere together to talk afterward?"
Hearing no
answer as he clicked the cap’s metal snaps in place, I continued, “I’m no
marriage counselor, but it sounds like you folks could use some alone time to
talk and share.., every week.”
Without waiting
for an answer, I quickly said “Nick, when’s the last time you took the girls to
a car show?”
He looked up
from trying to figure the firing order of the plug wires. He said, “They’re
girls. What would they get from a car show?”
“Lots!” I
answered. “My wife goes to shows with me. She, the one who is always shopping, tells me
which car she wants. My daughter munches hot dogs, drinks soda and takes
pictures of bumpers, hubcaps, and any cute animal hood ornaments she sees. Best
of all, we get to bum around, have fun and spend time together.”
“I spend time
with my family right here,” he returned.
I then struggled
to find the right words. “Nick.., please don’t continue to make an idol out of
this car. It’s not a god, but it sounds like it does take away your time and energy
from your family. Maybe you need to think a bit about some priorities.”
He straightened
up slowly. He kept looking at the engine for a long time. I thought he was getting angry. Finally he said, "You know Reverend, the fog is nearly gone. Your timing seems
to be just about right.”
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