Life As A Car Girl – The Early Years

This is the second story of this series. To read the first story see,
Life As A Car Girl – I Was Born Loving Cars

Upon entering school I was already playing with the same toys boys did. This became most evident during show and tell. For show and tell I would rather bring a live animal, but since bringing live animals to school was discouraged, I often brought one of my toy cars. If a teacher asked if there were any dolls at home I could bring, she was always met with a bewildered look. The girls seemed to be confused at my choice and would make fun of me, but the boys always approved and often would ask to play cars with me.

Horses were a large part of my life and just the sight of a horse would make me stop dead in my tracks. That is a whole other story. But always in the background were cars and the roar of a loud motor passing by made me look with wide eyed wonder.

My HotWheels and Matchbox’s were well worn. Though I played with them virtually everyday, I never abused them. I did play with them outside, but never in the mud. If they got too dirty, they got a bath. I guess that was the girl in me.

I loved to take things apart to see how they worked and begged for someone to teach me how to put things together and answer all my inquisitive questions. Most of the time however, no one would. Being a girl at that time meant no one took my love of cars and mechanical things seriously.

Many men recall how as boys they took everything apart – radios, drills, electronic toys, etc. I too, started to do that until caught one day and was harshly punished for it. The threat of not fixing or replacing whatever I took apart on top of the harsh punishment I was to receive was enough to squash the learning on my own activities. They couldn’t squash my love of speed though. Bikes, skates, big wheels, wagons, you name it, I had to be the fastest. If only we had those Power Wheels back then.

Here is an example of my love of speed. A story from when I was young:

We lived on a street that had a very long, steep hill. At the bottom of the hill, both the street and the sidewalk made a 90° turn to the left. Since we weren’t allowed to play in the street, we had to learn to navigate this hill and that sharp turn at a high rate of speed. To top it off, at the bottom of the hill, right at the turn, lived a mean old lady. (Doesn’t every neighborhood have a mean old person living in it?) All of us kids were terrified of her. We were not allowed to step foot in her yard. She was so mean that just the sight of her coming out onto her porch to yell at us made us all scatter like a herd of gazelles. Her yard, being at the bottom of this hill made us experts at handling high speed turns though. You see, being able to handle that sharp turn at high speed was not only cool, to us kids it was a matter of pure survival!. We knew if that mean old lady ever caught us we would never be seen or heard from again! The thrill of it all made it worth it though.

Picture this, if you will. With our big wheels in hand, we made the push up the long, steep hill. (How I long for that cardiovascular strength today!) Upon reaching the top, we would wait for a car to come driving into the neighborhood. You had to have a car to race against down the hill!
Upon seeing a car heading our way we would begin our running push. When the car reached a certain point in the road, like a crack in the pavement to start the “race”, we’d hop on and begin madly pedaling till our feet couldn’t keep up with the spinning pedals. We would then kick our feet out and begin the mad dash down the hill and the harrowing left hand turn at the bottom. The big wheels that had the hand brake were required if you ever hoped to make the turn without spinning out in the mean lady’s yard.

Though I didn’t understand the concept of aerodynamics back then, I did figure out that I went a little faster if I tucked my head down and kept my legs closer to the center rather than have them sticking straight out to the sides. This technique along with my fast sprint at the top allowed me to be one of the very few (and only girl) to be able to beat most of the cars to the bottom of the hill! Keep in mind, this was quite an accomplishment, to ride a big wheel averaging 15-20 mph. My older brothers still remark to this day what an amazing feat that was. Seeing their 5-6 year old little sister flying down the hill on my big wheel with my long hair flying behind me, my feet sticking out, the pedals spinning so fast they were just a blur, then being able to make that amazing turn was a sight to see they say. It was a skill that would amaze everyone who saw it and made our mothers gasp in horror. As a kid, I didn’t understand why my mom would get so upset. As a mom, I now understand, but it was still cool!

My son is showing the early signs of a love of speed, being a daredevil and having a curious nature of how things work. I guess he comes by it honestly since both his father and I were like this as kids and still are. I hope I can learn to be the kind of mother that encourages this adventurous and curious behavior while at the same time keeping him safe. I just don’t know yet how to do this without trips to the emergency room and everything from the toaster to the computer ending up being taken apart! I may get mad if one day I find the appliances in pieces and a little screwdriver in his hand, but I won’t punish him like I was. Though I may love my toaster oven, I love him more and I will want to encourage his curious nature. Even if it means having to buy a new toaster!