Flight of the Albatross
Life can be bittersweet. Even our successes can be tarnished by guilt, sadness, remorse, or desire. This past Friday was one of those days for me.
After a difficult day at work, I headed home knowing that I was scheduled to meet another customer who wanted to poke and prod my beloved Chevelle, and then let me know why it wasn’t worth much, and why I should sell it to them at a ridiculously low price, if at all.
I suppose there is no way of putting a true price on something you’re passionate about. I certainly wouldn’t take half as much guff from my Toyota as I did the Chevelle; that tiny marvel of Japanese/American engineering would be in the bone yard with all of the other forgotten mechanical children of man.
I had to wonder if this guy would even show up at the appointed time, as I’ve had a run of no-shows and late-shows the past few weeks; all of them conspiring to waste my time and make selling my car a full-time job. As regular readers will note, this has been going on since August.
To my surprise, the customer (who I’ll call “BG”) was waiting for me a half hour before our appointed time. Retired or not, this was very impressive for someone who lived over five hours away, and was racing bad weather the whole trip. Even more interesting was the fact that he was just recovering from a total replacement of his left knee; which is NOT conducive to driving a muscle car with a heavy mechanical clutch. He even had to employ the services of a friend to make the long drive down, even though his daily-driver was equipped with an automatic.
After a quick meet and greet, we trekked over to the storage place to see the car. The clouds were increasing, the temperature dropping, and a bitter wind was rising from the southwest. There’s nothing like the weather to add a sense of foreboding to an occasion.
After removing the cover, the gentlemen looked over the car and seemed appreciative. They both made some poor attempts at driving The Beast around the expansive lot, but only one of them had a bum knee to blame! BG’s friend even took the car for a drive down the roadways of East Whiteland, and gave his seal of approval, in light of a “touchy clutch”.
Then it was go time; time to get down to serious business. I could see the strain of the decision plainly written on BG’s face, as he kept trying to get me to budge on the price. I figured I would be going home without a deal as he hobbled into his car, out of the cold, to review my folder of automotive receipts. I lost track of time, but I know I was able to get the Chevelle covered back up by myself in the wind, and even crack open my Economics text book. Painful.
BG finally made a move to extricate himself from the passenger seat of his car. That’s when I saw him going for his cash. After months of aborted attempts, a deal was struck. The Beast was going to a new home in southern NY State.
After fighting our way through Frazer traffic, we were able to successfully transfer the title. The Albatross no longer hangs around my neck; it is flying to a new roost where it will, hopefully, get the chance to fly with someone who is able to dedicate the time to it that the bird deserves. Then it might be able to soar like an eagle again.
After a difficult day at work, I headed home knowing that I was scheduled to meet another customer who wanted to poke and prod my beloved Chevelle, and then let me know why it wasn’t worth much, and why I should sell it to them at a ridiculously low price, if at all.
I suppose there is no way of putting a true price on something you’re passionate about. I certainly wouldn’t take half as much guff from my Toyota as I did the Chevelle; that tiny marvel of Japanese/American engineering would be in the bone yard with all of the other forgotten mechanical children of man.
I had to wonder if this guy would even show up at the appointed time, as I’ve had a run of no-shows and late-shows the past few weeks; all of them conspiring to waste my time and make selling my car a full-time job. As regular readers will note, this has been going on since August.
To my surprise, the customer (who I’ll call “BG”) was waiting for me a half hour before our appointed time. Retired or not, this was very impressive for someone who lived over five hours away, and was racing bad weather the whole trip. Even more interesting was the fact that he was just recovering from a total replacement of his left knee; which is NOT conducive to driving a muscle car with a heavy mechanical clutch. He even had to employ the services of a friend to make the long drive down, even though his daily-driver was equipped with an automatic.
After a quick meet and greet, we trekked over to the storage place to see the car. The clouds were increasing, the temperature dropping, and a bitter wind was rising from the southwest. There’s nothing like the weather to add a sense of foreboding to an occasion.
After removing the cover, the gentlemen looked over the car and seemed appreciative. They both made some poor attempts at driving The Beast around the expansive lot, but only one of them had a bum knee to blame! BG’s friend even took the car for a drive down the roadways of East Whiteland, and gave his seal of approval, in light of a “touchy clutch”.
Then it was go time; time to get down to serious business. I could see the strain of the decision plainly written on BG’s face, as he kept trying to get me to budge on the price. I figured I would be going home without a deal as he hobbled into his car, out of the cold, to review my folder of automotive receipts. I lost track of time, but I know I was able to get the Chevelle covered back up by myself in the wind, and even crack open my Economics text book. Painful.
BG finally made a move to extricate himself from the passenger seat of his car. That’s when I saw him going for his cash. After months of aborted attempts, a deal was struck. The Beast was going to a new home in southern NY State.
After fighting our way through Frazer traffic, we were able to successfully transfer the title. The Albatross no longer hangs around my neck; it is flying to a new roost where it will, hopefully, get the chance to fly with someone who is able to dedicate the time to it that the bird deserves. Then it might be able to soar like an eagle again.
I’m sad to see it go, but at the same time, it has lifted a great burden off my shoulders. So concludes the muscle car era of my life…for now.
posted by TGB at
9:03 AM
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