Cars, motion, speed. From a young age, I could instantly recognize a family member’s presence based on their car. Growing up, my favorite movie was the Pixar film: Cars. It wasn’t until about the age of 11 or 12 that I recognized my true passion for cars, when my step Grandfather took me to my first Cars and Coffee. 

Beep-beep beep-beep beep-beep beep-beep, beep-beep-beep-beep-Ah! I jolt awake to the sound of my watch alarm. It is 6:20 AM on a Sunday. I rub my eyes and peek outside my window to get an idea of the weather, and hastily throw my t-shirt, jeans, and baseball cap on. I swiftly, yet noiselessly fly down the stairs and shove my shoes on–waiting in excitement for my Grandfather to arrive. I have heard and seen his car many times before but have never rode in it. I can’t wait – I think.

I hear a deep, low, rumbling sound from the road. The sound gets louder and I see the beautiful metallic-pearl blue Chevelle approaching. I wave and rush to the passenger side to enter and tenderly open the door. Grinning “ear-to-ear”, I exclaim: “Wow! This is really cool!”. My Grandpa smiles and says: “I like it, It has come a long way!”. All buckled in and anxious to go, we respectfully leave the neighborhood. 

Once on the road, I got the full essence of the car and its mechanical glory. The whirring of the straight-cut gears, the rattling of the windows and loose bolts, the throaty growl of the exhaust, and the whine of the engine as it yearned to go fast. I was wholly fascinated with the manual transmission and the smell of the oil and higher octane gasoline. It was a cool morning, but I was quite toasty from the heat of the powerful V8. 

Not wanting to frighten me, my Grandfather was a little apprehensive with the throttle, and took turns gently. Eventually, I asked him to go a little quicker and boy am I glad I did. Grandpa went down a gear and the low-rumbling sound faded as that Chevy small block screamed in the higher RPMs.