BlitzBlog

One of the earliest pictures I have of myself, or at least one that I
actually recall posing for, was a black-and-white shot of me sitting in
a small pedal fire truck. I was wearing some god-awful geeky outfit, my
hair all Brylcreemed to within an inch of its life, so it was probably
the first day of kindergarten or some holiday or such.

Anyway,
from the time of this photo, it's been a 40-something year journey as a
died-in-the-wool Car Guy. I don't know why I've been so nuts for cars
for so long. It's certainly not my upbringing. My dad, has only had
minimal interest in cars as toys. While he's always had great stories
concerning cars and such, he's never had any interest in them beyond
the practical notion of cars being transportation or for hauling stuff.

I know this, as he once told me of how he won, at the age of
about 20, an Auburn boat-tail speedster in a poker game. He has only
vague memory of driving it or what happened to it. When I told him of
what the car's present day value might be (around $1,000,000) he
shrugged. He thinks he traded it for a 12-seater Reo that he used, to
haul families to the Catskills and back, for money. Today, I suppose
this would compare to trading a Ferrari Enzo for a Ford Econoline
church van.

So dad wasn't a Car Guy.

My mother didn't even learn to drive until she was in her mid-thirties, when she and dad moved out of Manhattan.

So mom was not a Car Girl.

So genetics doesn't seem to play any role in my being a Car Guy.

I
think, when I look back, that being a Car Guy, as an adult, is a
culmination of various reinforcing events that took place in my life. I
think this must be so, as it seems all little boys are predisposed
towards car and trucks, but the interest seems to wane as many get
older. I think several serendipitous events, even small ones, that
occur at critical points in life, are what keep that flame burning,
until it just seems to either go out, or finally catch and turn into
the Eternal Flame of Car Guy-ness.

For me, in the earliest
times, it was my collection of Matchbox and Corgi cars, with a new Hess
truck almost every Chanukah. I think the age of 8 was a pivotal time in
preserving the Car Kid behavior, as I think Hot Wheels came out about
then (which were way faster than Matchboxes), and it was then when I
graduated to Aurora (pre-AFX) H.O. slot cars. I was also 8 when I got
my first “real” full-size slot car- a bronze colored Corvette Stingray-
that I would use when my Dad would take me racing at a local slot car
track in Bayside, Queens. I also distinctly recall seeing my first
“Wow!” car around this time. It was a custom-painted Camaro in a
metal-flake Kelly green with white stripes and a white vinyl top and
interior. I remember sitting on the sidewalk, staring transfixed at
this car parked on Northern Boulevard. To this day, I have never seen
one with a paint job like it (and considering the number of custom
Camaros that have seen the light of day over 35+ years, this is saying
something).

The slot-car experience kept my Car Kid flame
burning for the next few years. We moved from Queens, to New Jersey
around this time. At my new home, I had a 4'x8' plywood sheet that I
affixed to a piano hinge on some 2×4s on my bedroom wall. The plywood
had (by now) AFX track mounted on it, with painted run-off areas and
grandstands and other diorama-like models of trees and people and
houses originally meant for model train sets, glued around the track. I
recall making trips to Paul's Hobby Shop in the next town, with a few
bucks in hand - earned with my paper-route- to buy all sorts of sundry
items, from cars and parts to trees and that green sand-papery stuff
that was supposed to be itty bitty grass.

My friends and I could
spend hours racing in my bedroom, avoiding homework and other
parentally-induced obligations. On some Sundays, we could even race
with the TV on, while ABC's Wide World of Sports broadcast a nascent
NASCAR race with King Richard Petty and Cale Yarbourough trading paint
in the background.

But the “real racing,” to me, were the
times my dad brought me to O'Dowd's in Pine Brook. O'Dowd's was
primarily an ice cream restaurant, but to an 11-year old Car Kid, the
ice-cream was only food. The REAL treat was what could be found BEHIND
O'Dowd's, where there were 2 very large rooms. The first was a cigar
smoke infused billiards room, with a few dozen tables where my dad used
to kick my tail at 8-Ball, even when he played one-handed. The next
room, even larger, was a combination slot-car/video game/pinball
arcade. They had 3 big slot-car tracks where one could rent a
controller and car to race, or you could “run-what-you-brung.”

I
began with my bronze Stingray, but soon realized it was by any measure,
dog slow. Since I didn't have enough money, and dad wasn't gonna spend
money on yet another car, I began looking into fixing up the Stingray
to tweak more performance out of it. A dollar here for some new motor
brushes, a few more for different gears, maybe some stickier tires, and
the old gal started to become competitive. I guess my dad noticed my
budding enthusiasm, and for my 12th birthday, he bought me the
Cucaracha I'd been eyeballing every time we went near the slot car
parts counter. The Cucaracha was, at the time, the best out-of-the-box
slot car you could buy. It was even faster than my Stingray, and
handled amazingly. With the Cucaracha I was able to enter the “stock”
races and be very competitive, even winning every so often. (I only
wish I knew where those trophies went!).

As I got a bit older, I
saw the bigger kids, and a few adult men, showing up at the Master's
races, with heavy wooden kit-boxes. The boxes had all sorts of
home-built racers and all the parts and tools they needed in them.
Their custom slot cars were mere blurs as they zipped around the track,
and the made even my fearsome Cucaracha look like an orange slug. I
started hanging behind some of the older guys, trying to glean some
knowledge from them. I'd peek into their kits to see what secrets they
held and what parts they stocked. After a few months of saving, I sold
my Stingray to another kid, and bought my own wooden race box. I
slapped all sorts of stickers on it to make it look cool. STP, Esso,
Firestone, and some non-sequitor ones from Wrangler or Kool cigarettes.
I started building some decent cars and got some class-wins, although I
would never say I was one of “the guys to beat” at O'Dowd's.

By
the time I was 16, I was already looking into real cars and knew I'd
better start saving my money instead of spending it on toys. I
eventually sold my whole kit'n'kaboodle to one of my competitors and
used the money as part of the payment for my first street car. I
considered it a point of pride that it was one of the older racers who
bought my box this time, as he must have thought I had some decent
equipment to make it worth it purchasing.

The down payment went
to my mom. She'd agreed to sell me her 1971 Montego for whatever the
dealer offered her in trade for a new car (what bacame her dreaded 1977 Volare, or The VoLemon- ack!). In any
case, after I paid mom $1100, the 351-Windsor motored Montego was all
mine, and with actual car-ownership, my entry into Full Fledged Car
Guy-dom was complete.

(I shall continue this Car-Guy history in running installments. Stay tuned for future episodes.)

I was sitting in traffic the other day, just pondering the world, and
got to thinking about a conversation I'd had recently with a friend who
was trying to “find her way” in her life. She said that I seemed to be,
from all appearances, a pretty contented man, and wondered if this was
actually true, and if if it was, how did I get to be this way? I
started to think, “What am I, the freakin' Dalai Lama?”

But I
took in what she had said, and glanced inward, and thought that, yes, I
AM a reasonably contented person. While I am by no means fully
satisfied with everything in my life, and I have problems and desires
like everybody else, the thing I have learned that keeps me grounded is
that I know What Makes Me Happy. For me, it's not an incredibly
expensive or complicated list of things that make me happy, so it is
not difficult for me to experience these things (or even reminisce on
these things) so that I can keep my general Happiness Quotient in the
black.

I explained to this woman that to be happy, you need to
decide on What Makes You Happy, and keep this as one's goal. To think
of this list as a centering line in one's life and to always come back
to it to find balance and joy. (This is some deep shit, eh?)

Now
maybe I'm lucky in that I don't need expensive toys to keep me happy.
Yes, I do have some extravigant wants, but they are not central to my
happiness. They are just that- wants. Would I love a new Mercedes and
regular vacations in the Caribbean? Hell yeah, I would! But I've owned
enough fun toys to know that it's not the toys themselves that bring me
the joy. It's the people I get to share them with that does. And if
it's the people that I'm enjoying, then do I even need the toys?

Hell yeah! I may be a bit spiritual, but I'm not crazy!

So
next time you're sitting in traffic, grinding your teeth, relax
yourself and ponder the things that might bring you Joy. Not the Things
You Want, but just think back on the good feelings you've had in your
life, and ponder just…..What Makes You Happy.

So in no particular order, I present
Things That Make Me Happy:

Remembering
how my daughter, from the time she was an infant, up until she was
probably 2 or 3 years old, had a fascination with my eyebrows. As an
infant, when I would give her her bottle before bedtime and rock her to
sleep in my arms, she would reach up and play with my eyebrow.

Friday
night dinners with my family, and sometimes with friends, where we
welcome Shabbat and sit around the table. I get to gaze at my beautiful
wife and kids while we take turns listing our week's “thankfuls” and
“mitzvahs.”

The quiet of the house after everyone has gone to bed.

The memory of my infant son's belly laugh.

Watching our chickens. (Hey I don't know why, but it's my list. Just shut up and read. Jeez.)

The deep breath I take when I lay down and snuggle next to my wife and take in her scent every night.

Weekend
mornings when my dogs go nuts announcing the arrival of my dad, who
bears bagels and lox for us, and treats for the yapping pooches.

Watching my son's face when he swims a personal-best time at his swim meets.

The boozy contented smile of my friend Dave when we're out enjoying some sordid adventure.

Thinking back on my hole-in-one. July 5, 2004- a date I shall never forget.

A nice drive in a car I love.

Feet in sand, beer in hand.

A great sundae.

Discovering, or even re-discovering some music I love.

Late afternoon on the golf course, especially with good friends.

The sound of my son making music. Even badly.

Watching my daughter run like she's flying.

The
feeling I get when I walk through a crowded room of strangers and I see
them all looking at my wife, and wondering what she's doing with me.

(Partial List. I shall no doubt think of other things and post them at a future date. Maybe next time I hit traffic.)

I'd ridden lightweight dirt bikes in my teens but it wasn't until about
10 years later, in the early 80s, that I got my first road bike, a
Honda Magna. I was well versed in the dangers of riding, so I bucked up
for a top of the line Shoei.

Now my friend Mike had owned a
little KZ175 (or something equally light) and told me one day that one
of the cool things about riding a bike around in New Jersey (sometimes
known as the Toll Booth State) is that when one is on a bike and goes
through an exact change toll booth lane, there's always a few quarters
on the ground that you can pick up and chuck into the basket. “Neat,” I
thought, “Next time I go down the Garden State Parkway, I'll check it
out.”

So a nice warm Friday night in June beckons. Mike and I
are gonna go out that evening. I head down the Parkway, along with a
billion other Jersey-shore-bound motorists. Typical Friday night
traffic for the summer. I get to the Essex Toll Plaza and pull into a
lane. I look down, and there, next to my right foot, is a shiny
quarter. So I reach down to pick it up…

Now I neglected to
mention that Mike's old KZ weighed about 250 pounds less than my
water-cooled 750 (something that Mike didn't mention either).

….so
I reach down for this measly little quarter and I feel the bike slowly
starting to lean over too far along with me. “Uh oh!” I then attempt to
straighten back up to pull the bike back up, but the handlebar catches
on the back bottom edge of my helmet!

….and then starts forcing the back of the helmet up, and the front down over my eyes.

….and
then pushes my head slowly, aaaaaaagonizingly slowly, … completely
upside down and grinds the top of my head into the 1-inch buildup of
grease that resides in the tollbooth lane. My butt is sticking straight
up in the air and my head is looking through my legs along the exhaust
pipe back (and upside down) at the guy who is behind me (with his
girlfriend) who are both torn between shock and laughing hysterically.

I
finally have to slip my foot out so I can just drop the bike and
extricate myself from this humiliation. Of course, the carbs flood so
it stalls, so I end picking up the stinkin' quarter, slamming it in the
basket, picking up the bike and pushing it dejectedly across 5 lanes of
traffic to the shoulder to let the carbs drain.

I'm too
embarrassed to take my helmet off, so when I do finally get to Mike's
house, to make matters worse, he asks me what the clump of black stuff
on the top of my helmet is.

There's a hoi-paloi semi-public golf course in my town, It's a Jack
Nicklaus-designed course that charges $125 a round. Quite
coincidentally, I assure you, we celebrated my son's Bar Mitzvah at the
course's clubhouse last March with a a lovely catered affair. As luck
would have it, with the hiring of the clubhouse hall came 4 “anytime”
passes for 4 rounds of golf at the illustrious Mansion Ridge Golf
course.

So today, myself and 3 buddies, Mark, Marc and Rob went
out on a rare 80-degree October day to use the club's facilities. Now I
must preface this tome with a description of our golfing abilities.

Basically we all suck.

We suck to varying degrees of course, but each of us, in our own unique way, suck.

A
good day for Rob or me is anything under 100. For Marc, 100-110 is a
good round, and well, Mark….sigh. Mark just really really sucks. I'm
sure he'd be a better player if his clubs didn't look like they had
just been borrowed from the walls of the local TGI Fridays, but my
guess is that he'd play better, but he'd still suck. Just not as much.

Marc,
on the other hand, has some decent equipment to use on the course,
although he prefers to use his trusty 7-wood for just about any shot
between 50 and 350 yards. I haven't figured out the logic of his using
this club as he does, but Marc just seems to feel comfortable hitting
it in just about any situation. Of course, this just means he can
skull, slice, or top the shot in any direction at any time, but at
least he's comfortable doing so.

Rob, who's probably 6'4″
250lb can crush the ball a mile (today he had a shot at eagle on a huge
downhill 340 yard par 4 when he drove the ball 3 feet short of the
green, onto the fringe. And if you must ask, no he didn't eagle, but he
at least recorded the only birdie of the day).

Me, I'm so
consistently inconsistent (or inconsistently consistent) that I know
exactly what a bi-polar, manic depressive person must feel like. I can
scream a 200 yard 2 iron to 3 feet and then miss the putt. I can banana
slice a drive further right than Rush Limbaugh, and on the next hole
duck-hook a daisy-cutter 150 yard across the next fairway to the left.

Basically, we suck.

So
why do I play this blasted game? It aggravates me more than almost
anything in my life, and yet I enjoy being out on the course more than
almost anything in my life. A gorgeous Fall day like today, with the
sun shining brightly on the leaves that are just turning, the smell of
a nice Cohiba burning and the swearing of my cohorts as we banter about
each other's shortcomings is like Heaven. We grit our teeth at our own
failings and we laugh endlessly at and with our friends as we flail
futilely at that stupid, stupid inert little round bastard called a
golf ball.

We tell bad jokes and we talk about each others'
wives and daughters in lascivious ways, especially in the middle of
someone's backswing, yet we backslap and applaud those rare excellent
shots. We belch with gusto as someone is putting but we never walk in
anyone's line. We offer clubs and swing advice and then laugh
hysterically when the ball finds the only tree within a mile.

Speaking
of trees (and I HAVE been told that the most useful utility club I
could carry would be a machete), I can tell you a story of Mark and The
Tree.

This happened a few years ago on another local course. We
were teeing off on 16, a long straight uphill bitch of a par 4. Along
the right side, about 40-100 yards out, is a pond. Beyond that, is a 20
yard patch of mud flat before the woods fill in in earnest as the hole
starts uphill. Mark tees off, pushing his drive low and right. The ball
skips once, twice across the surface of the pond. Then it begins the
little pitty pat dance, and just so barely barely rolls up about 3 feet
onto the slick mud at the far end. We walk up to the ball and Mark
pulls out an iron. The ball is caked with clay and sitting up on a flat
spot of slick-as-shit wet mud. There's an 18-inch-wide, 10-foot-tall
dead tree stump about 6 feet in front of the ball. Mark decides he's
going to pitch out onto the fairway. I can see he's having a hard time
getting his footing just walking near the ball, and as he sets up, he's
twisting his feet like he's in a sand trap, to give himself a better
base. I'm thinking that if he doesn't pick the ball clean, he's going
to break his wrists when the club slaps into the heavy mud. I offer
that he just pick up and take a drop, but he's determined (or more
likely, resigned) to escaping mud-hell with some dignity. Mark seems to
be set up aiming awfully close to the tree stump, trying to pitch as
far up the fairway as he can, but when he swings, he loses his footing
and starts bailing out. The club thwacks the brown ball almost cleanly,
but with a wide open face that sends the ball immediately towards the
tree. It clocks the stump dead center about 6 feet up, ricocheting high
up, back over Mark's head, and plunks 20 feet behind him right back
into the pond. Luckily Mark catches his balance before he winds up as
wet or muddy as the ball.

While, in telling this story, I see
it's not nearly as hysterical as it was in actual viewing, but it does
illustrate that one doesn't necessarily have to be good at golf to get
enjoyment out of it. As a matter of fact, on those few occasions when
I've had some seasons of actually playing well, I actually started
having LESS fun, as I begin to take my game more seriously. I suppose
it's not truly LESS fun, but maybe just a different kind of fun. And
while yes, this particular story is fun at my good friend Mark's
expense, there are probably the same stories my pals could tell where
I've embarrassed myself in similar fashion.

In any case, getting
back to our day at Mansion Ridge. On this particular day, there was an
outing of the Executive Women's Golf Association going on, and we were
foolish enough to think we'd get a full round in before dark, as we
tee'd off at about 12:35 or so. At 4 o'clock, we'd slogged through 12
holes (that's 3.5 hours!) and since we'd all figured on being done by
4:30, we played the par 3 13th and turned around to head in to whatever
chores we all head left for the day. I will refrain from kvetching
about the pace-of-play that women seem to ascribe to, but let's just
say that I've only met one woman golfer in my life that could squeeze
in a four-hour round of 18 holes. Why this is, I cannot tell you. It
may be that women are more pensive about their shots, or they will look
for a ball in the woods longer than a man, or maybe their legs are just
shorter and they take longer to walk to their next shot. I don't know,
but on this day, we had 20 foursomes of executive females bringing our
game to a standstill, and with food shopping (Rob, me) or other chores
(Mark) or a long motorcycle trip to a friend's home (Marc) to
accomplish, the day got short and since none of us were shooting
anywhere near bogie golf, we packed it in and went our separate ways.

Later, as I watched the sun set at a local lake with my family, I thought to myself, “This was a Good Day.”

It is a little-known historical fact that the true originators of the
idea of a democratic society were the ancient manufacturers of bumper
stickers. Picture ornate horse-drawn carriages with “George W—He’s on
the money! Vote Washington in ’88″ That of course, is 1788, which if
memory serves, was a landslide.

In election years, there’ll be a
rise in the number of bumper stickers on our more modern carriages on
the highways. To win, a candidate’s name must fit easily, even in bold
print. (I believe someone should do a study on this).

Besides
the “Vote for…” stickers, I’ve noticed that locally, there seems to be
a disproportionate number of parents who’s kids are on honor rolls. The
schools in this area are either really great, really easy, or there’s
something in the water. Conversely, other stickers convey that many
parents are quite sure of their children's ability to beat up these
brainiacs.

Parents are not the only braggarts, however. Certain
car owners seem to be particularly proud of their vehicles’ ability to
go up hills, especially big ones like New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington.

We
also have the Lovers. These are folks who are so enthusiastic in their
affinity for (pick one) a restaurant, breed of dog, or a State of our
Union that they use that wonderful little “heart” symbol to express
their affection. I once purchased a roll of little round stickers with
a picture of a screw on them. I used to keep a few handy in my wallet
for such occasions when I could place the “screw” stickers over the
little hearts. This, no doubt, caused many dog owners to have to do a
lot of explaining.

Without wanting to offend anyone with a
Higher Power, it seems that those folks with bumper stickers telling me
how much they love their god/their god loves us, seem to drive like
they are the most afraid of meeting Their Maker. If I was so assured of
my place in The Next Life, I’d drive like every day is the last lap at
OC Speedway (though some think I already do).

Other things I’ve
learned from bumper stickers is that there are many ways to make German
words sound obscene; that Karmas often run over Dogmas; that If I Don’t
Like How someone is driving, I Should Stay Off the Sidewalk; that I
probably can’t ski Mad River Glen; that nobody actually ever spells out
Nine Inch Nails because it just doesn’t look as cool as the NIN logo;
that patriotically-colored skulls and dancing bears represent a
laid-back lifestyle; and that there is great debate over the people in
which profession make the best lovers, and that each seems to Do It in
their own interesting way.

So if you see me driving down the
road some time, my bumpers naked to the world, you may wonder Who did I
vote for? What kind of dog does this man love? Can his car climb Big
Hills? And just what cool music is he listening to while he ponders his
place in this World?

And oh yes, as far-out as Farkengrüven may be, Mean People really do Suck.