I tried not to lean against
anything. Leaning, I Feared, would give the wrong impression. It could
seem too casual. Sitting was also not an option. I also did my level
best not to make eye contact. This was harder than it sounds. When you
are surrounded by people with dentition that resembles broken picket
fences and forearms adorned with jail house style tattoos (some
apparently made by carving shapes into the skin then pouring India ink
into the wound) it's very difficult to look anywhere other than their
eyes. Fear causes this.
He seemed to bring back his
memories in full color HD detail in my mind. A lot of those stories are
fleeting at best, I am sure he added in his own little exaggerated
touches but back then it didn't matter. That is what Deer Camp stories
did for me in D&DH magazine in the off season too. My Dad used to call
my grandfather a bullshitter and never fully understood that till after
growing up and experiencing life for myself. I think this life needs
bullshitters to carry on that tradition of deer hunting we have all come
to love.
To give
you an idea of the depth of the collection, on display is a 1926
Rolls-Royce. Wilbert Grinsven, the curator tells me that there were only
two years that Rolls-Royce manufactured cars in the United States. Those
years were 1926 and 1927. This car is one of the few Rolls Royce's made
here during that time. The auto manufacturer decided that it was not
economically feasible to continue manufacturing autos in the US and
closed its factory here in the states after only 2 years. Another
example of a beautiful old car is a car used in the movie "Driving Miss
Daisy". http://www.wikihow.com/Find-a-Good-Used-Engine
Noticing at first
that I was completely exhausted from staying in the protective fight or
flight mode, I began to question whether or not I could handle this
responsibility. I went through a journey of emotions from anger to
shame. How could I be a babysitter when I had a business to run and a
life of my own? What did I do to deserve this punishment? These were
thoughts that took residence in my mind during the first months. The questions continued and
I kept dodging them. Finally he dismissed me with a frustrated wave of
his hand. I went back through the corridor that Li-Li had led me
earlier, but I didn't see her when I returned to the bar. In fact, I
never saw her again nor did I ever return to the Shadow Bar.
I had just started on another beer when someone dropped a few
coins in the juke box. The music was bad country. To my utter disgust
the first song that played was that "I want to stick a boot up your
butt" super-patriotic, ultra-jingoist thing by the guy in the
buy truck online used commercials. The people around me began to sing
along loudly. I'd never been in a fraternity in
college and only had one brother, so I never had to prove much in my
lifetime. No initiation rights, crazy acts of bravado. Not even tested
in war or proven to be a man. Sure, I've had some success in business,
but sitting in that truck with a man like Harvey just brought all those
male hormones to the front burner. Hot or mild. Just what kind of chile
man was I to become? The end of the story is
we were able to get the lawyer for Ford Motor Credit to accept a much
lesser amount because he was trying to get a default judgment on his
fees. That was illegal here in Florida, so with his hands in the cookie
jar, he just wanted to get it over rather than have his name placed in
front of the Florida Bar Assn. So
there you have it. I have listed some of the more popular accessories
for a Ford truck. Of course there are many more such as performance
tuners and if you are going all out you can completely upgrade the
suspension. That will be another post for another day however. Until
then happy trucking my friends, hope to see you out at the truck
shows.