A STORY WORTH TELLING
“A hobby a day keeps the doldrums away.” — Phyllis McGinley
Everyone needs a hobby — crafting, creating or collecting.
I started collecting model cars as a kid before moving on to real ones.
Still dabbling in both, I found myself surveying the “stable” last week. I was in the garage, wondering how much longer I’ll keep these final three steeds: a 1957 Thunderbird, a ’55 Ford Crown Victoria and my grandmother’s “bought new” ‘57 Ford. Everybody has their own take on hobbies. A good friend and business associate, whose “hobby” was collecting cows (he called it “ranching”), quizzed me late one evening on the subject decades ago.
“Isn’t it expensive and lots of work taking care of those old cars?” he asked.
I pitched another log on the fire we started to keep warm while checking on his small herd before a cold front arrived.
“You mean as compared to taking care of cows?” I said with a smile.
He grinned and I waited before adding in friendly jest, “I don’t recollect ever feeding my old cars in the rain and cold. And if I ignore them, they’re still in the garage when I come back.”
Last week in the garage, I ran my fingertips in the dust along the rear fender of the Thunderbird’s tailfin. Then I stuck my head inside the Crown Vic to take in the distinctive aroma of oldcar upholstery before glancing at Granny’s car where new brake parts remained in boxes on the floor.
When I put them there, I remember saying, “I’ll get back to this next week.”
Was that 2023 or 2024? I occasionally start up the autos because I want the same thing for them that I want for myself — to wear out rather than rust out.
Fun and fast cars have been a part of my life ever since I started reading automotive magazines. I purchased a copy of Car Craft in the sixth grade, the first time I put the comic book back on the shelf and grabbed the auto magazine instead.
That was also around the time I attended a quartermile drag race at the legendary drag strip at the old Caddo Mills airfield.
I went with Mount Pleasant High School senior Larry Ward. He worked after school at Perry Brothers, where Dad was the manager. Larry was a car guy with a cool 1954 Plymouth sporting checkerboard flipper hubcaps, and it fell to my good fortune that Larry noticed this carcrazy kid and invited me to tag along with him and his girlfriend, Barbara Riley.
That was actually my second drag race.
Credit for attending my first goes to my father when I was about 9 or 10, which is something I’ve never figured out because Dad had no appreciation whatsoever for flash or fast in automobiles. His transportation philosophy focused on six-cylinders, standard shift, no power, no air conditioning, barebones rides.
Yet I vividly remember the West Texas racetrack near Lake Kemp when we lived in Seymour. I also never forgot being astounded at watching an old, beat-up-looking jalopy dust off a brandnew white 1958 Ford Thunderbird like it was sitting still.
I was hooked.
Dad began shaking his head after I bought my first car at 15 and started spending Friday nights at Stracener Drag Strip in Bettie and Saturday nights at Interstate Raceway near Tyler.
“Son,” he lectured me, “cars are just transportation to get from point A to point B.”
“Sorry Dad,” I said.
“It’s too late … and you kinda started it.”
So, after stamps, model cars and comic books, I’ve spent my three score and ten years collecting cars.
And now? The last in a long line sit slumbering in the garage.
Is it time they graced someone else’s garage?
Spend sunny afternoons at car shows again? Awaken memories for others as they have for me?
Now, don’t go calling the retirement home.
I’m not swapping my mid-50s bench seats for a recliner. Let’s just call it thinning the herd.
Cars have been my lifelong hobby, and I’m not ready for the doldrums.
Who knows, maybe I’ll finally get the brakes fixed on Granny’s car?
— Contact Aldridge at leonaldridge@gmail. com. Other Aldridge columns are archived at leonaldridge.com.
