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.
The place was peopled by extras from "Hells
Angels on Wheels" and every bad prison movie ever made. This woman kept
bumping into me. She was medium height, slender, had long brown hair and
three teeth. Her face looked a little like it had caught fire and some
caring person had tried to put it out with an ax. Every time we collided
I apologized nervously and she walked away. From behind she could have
been Miss America. I swear.
I
would like to speak directly to you, the reader. Learning to walk again
can be used as a reference point at any time in your life when you feel
overwhelmed with the sting of your environment, beaten down with the
storms of life or simply afraid to journey into brand new areas. http://www.answers.com/Q/How_can_you_convert_your_1968_Chevy_truck_rear_end_to_positraction
Hannah's was just a hole-in-the-wall, long and
narrow with a bar running almost the whole length of the building. The
brick on the face of the building, and the white wooden door outside,
were nearly black from years of soot from the coke plant and steel
mills. Patrons tended to be older folks who spent what was left of their
paychecks on booze, Polish sausages, hard-boiled eggs, and illegal tip
boards. In 1970 my husband bought a Dodge R/T for $5000. The
price of the car was usually a bit less, but this particular car had all
the bells and whistles needed to be a true Muscle Car. If kept in mint
condition this car would now be worth approximately $50,000. He was
young and foolish though; blew up the engine, and just trashed the car.
To this day, the thought of his youthful waste makes him kind of
sick.
There were three major car
manufacturers. Ford, General Motors and Chrysler. Each manufacture had a
following. Arguments could erupt over which car was the best. A man's
Dodge pickup was a source of pride. Sunday morning the family would
dress in their best clothes and get into a Buick for the trip to church.
The Cadillac represented power and money while the Ford and Chevrolet
represented the working people. People that lived in the country had a
buy truck rims. It was a working
truck and on Saturday's the kids jumped in the back for a trip to
town. Jumping off the back of the
deuce-and-half truck, brushing through the crowd of peanut girls, I
headed to the bar. It was a beautiful day with sunlight dappling the
shaded roadway. It all came back to her then, how he'd lain sobbing in his room
across from hers while the man raged in the livingroom, how she'd
slipped into his twin bed with him and wrapped her arms around him until
he was finally asleep, how she'd read chapters of "Charlotte's Web" to
him each night, how he'd raced on his bike through the dark streets the
night they'd finally made their escape. She'd let him in on it early on,
told him all about her plan to find a new place where it would be just
the two of them and how he wouldn't ever again have to lie awake at
night afraid of what was going on in the livingroom or of what he'd see
in the morning as he headed out for school. He'd told no one. It was
their secret. The PC is
no longer the only way of accessing the Internet. We now have PDA's and
cellphones that can access the Internet, and send and receive e-mail. By
this time next year, as more people learn the use and benefit of these
devises; anything needed to maintain and restore these Classic Car
investments can be obtained while driving down the road.