>After all these wonderful adjectives, and of course some sacrificial
>blood to the Gods of Triumph, then on a warm, sunny day ... top down
>... engine purring ... wind in your hair, it is finally and
>completely just a Helluva Lot of FUN ...
Bill and Annabelle,
Yeah, about that sacrificial blood offering to the metal gods. Hard on the
heels of Randall's posting about how close he came to an exploding air
compressor recently, it's a timely observation.
Years ago while restoring the gas tank on my Datsun 2000 Roadster, my hand
slipped trying to bust loose a nut, and on jagged metal ripped a 3 inch gash
to the bone over the knuckle on my left middle finger. Had to wrap it with
a towel to keep the blood out of my pickup, loaded up my youngest son, then
age 5, and headed off to the Emergency Room. There, the doctor found out I
work with the agency that determines eligibility for Medicaid, so he stopped
in mid stitch while blood from my finger pulsed into white gauze, to
expostulate about the unfortunate experiences he had had with that social
program...occupational hazard for him, and unfortunately for me too. At
least my blood leaked from the extended middle finger, so I could settle for
the invisible symbolism of that.
The Triumph gods, however, unlike the Datsun pagan gods, have been
relatively kind, exacting only the barest minimum of corpuscular donation.
Banged knuckles, cuts from reaching to impossible places, and a deep
forehead cut from an unfortunate coincidence involving a suddenly lifted
head into a sadly immobile steel dash. And for reasons I forget, before
ever starting the car, my dried blood like a badge of honor decorates the
fresh paint on my engine block, where it will forever reside under all
layers of engine oil grime, perhaps celestial punishment for allowing the
machinist to boil off the "3A" painted in red over the old, original black
painted cast iron. This '59 TR3A is mine, and DNA tests will prove it.
Nonetheless, I consider myself fortunate not to have been in Randall's
shoes. The closest I've been to a large air compressor exploding was an
unfortunate dinner shared once with my wife's mother where I thoughtlessly
made comment on a moral issue involving a decision she had made...but that's
another story....
Terry Smith ('59 TR3A TS 58667)
New Hampshire
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