Sassy Dream Cars & Then There is Reality!

Everyone has a dream car.

Back when I was too young to drive but so looking forward to the day when I could get behind the wheel, mine was a 1959 Corvette. They had one on display down at the Chevrolet dealership in Tishomingo, Oklahoma. And even though it was about a mile out of the way, I’d walk down there after school, stand across the street and do some powerful wishing. If I could have that car, I would name it Jett Rink after James Dean’s character in Giant. He was wild, unpredictable and downright sexy (although we didn’t use that word right out in public when I was barely a teenager).

I did not come from rich folks who could buy me a car like that when I got old enough to drive. Matter of fact, I learned to drive my Poppa’s old ’54 rusted out two tone green Chevy with a stick shift. But that didn’t keep me from wanting to sit behind the wheel of Jett Rink just one time. I’m sure that there are still drool marks on the hood from the time I got up enough nerve to actually go in there and touch that beautiful vehicle.

As I got older my dream car stayed the same right up until a few months ago when I started writing a novel that centers around a road trip some folks take in an old ’59 Caddy. Mollybedamned is her name and she becomes a secondary character in the book. No, she doesn’t talk like the Mr. Ed horse on television all those years ago, but she does have quite a lot of personality.

Mollybedamned got her name from that old movie, The Brothers O’Toole. Seems that movie was a favorite of Frankie and Ivy’s. They are the two elderly ladies on the road trip with Ivy’s sixteen year old niece, Frankie’s daughter and newly found granddaughter she had no idea she had and a lawyer Frankie coerced into driving for them.

The car and I struck up a friendship and before I knew it when someone asked me what my dream car was, I had a vision of Mollybedamned instead of Jett Rink. Dear Lord, I had gotten old in the past fifty years! What happened to Jett Rink?

Please don’t tell anyone that I’d changed cars in the middle of the stream. It would ruin my reputation. I’d always gone for the wild, unpredictable, bad-boy fast cars.

Then yesterday, Mr. B called me into his office to see a e-mail about a line up of vintage cars and there was one of Jett Rink in all his radiant glory. Red with the white swoosh, dangerous looking, fast running. My heart beat a skipped a beat and my pulse raced.

Then I looked at the price. Holy smokin’ blazes! I expect a foundation, two bathrooms and at least a two car garage for that kind of money. Jett Rink might be fast, wild and bad ass but he’d have to find another lady to worship him at that price. Besides, I’m pretty sure my blood pressure cuff would blow plumb up if Jett sat in my garage and I actually got behind the wheel every day.