Lowriders of Death 2

I have never had the good times that I have had in my beloved 79 Buick Regal. This car was the cause of some of my greatest adventures. Being a backyard rig it up mechanic intensified the times of misfortune in my car. There is one lesson you must learn being a pathological switch hitting lowrider, never wear clothes that you don’t want to destroy.

One of my favorite stories doesn’t involve fire or terror but it makes me laugh when I think about it. I got my license at the age of 17 but it had restrictions and I practiced twice before I went and got it. Needless to say I didn’t know how to drive real well, I was working at the age of 16 and I got a car before I had a license. This created some problems when it came to dropping me off at work because I was in high school. My dad would drop me off all the time but after I got my car I would beg him to come get me in the lowrider.

This is also the time when I was learning how hydraulics worked and the ins and outs of hooking up a hydraulic system. I have this bad habit of finding things out the hard way. My hydraulic hoses were left just hanging when they were installed but I didn’t think much of it at the time, everything worked fine what could possibly go wrong. The hoses would drag on the ground when the car would sit too low but I didn’t drive it so what could happen in the back yard.

One day after work I called my dad to come pick me up and then I asked him if the car was working, he said it was so I asked him if he could bring it. After some haggling he agreed to drive the car to my job. As soon as he showed up everyone came out to see it. I picked up the switch box and gave my audience a show, front, back, side to side. As I was hitting the switch all of a sudden, “bzzzzzzzzz” and the left side of the car fell. At this point and time at its lowest the car would sit about 3 fingers off the ground. The sound was the left hose blowing open because the hoses were dragging for so long. I didn’t have a license so my dad would have to drive home which was on the other side of town. I lifted the other side of the car so the car wouldn’t be completely flat on the ground for the drive home.

The following drive home was full of awkward silences sprinkled between rants of “I Told You So” and burning stares of contempt as he glared up at me from the ground his side was stuck on. Hell, I love that story!