Grandpa Started It

I had to laugh when I found this picture mixed within dad’s slides. I guess my love of convertibles started back when I was only 3 and a half. Grandpa had special ordered me this dark green and white Kidillac from a magazine. I was the only kid in my neighborhood with one.

I can remember my short little legs didn’t quiet reach the peddles, so for the first year I had to Fred Flinstone it to get any where. This fancy little car with its working horn and rear view mirror was in many a neighborhood sidewalk parade. The parade would start on the sidewalk in front of our house and wrap around the corner to my very best friends house. That was about as far as the sidewalk would go.

We never went past her driveway on the broken sidewalk up towards the “Red Onion” where the renters all lived. You never knew who was renting those apartments, the yelling, screaming and slamming doors managed to scare us young folk into keeping our distance. It was a place you wanted to go, but never dared and feared parental wrath if you ever did.

Tricycles, wagons, and our peddle tractor were all in the make shift parade. Rattling, bumping and rolling along to imaginary, waving crowds, in the summer sun kept us busy for an hour or two. Turning the corner was my favorite part of the trip. The couple that lived in that big 2 story house always had flowers planted on the corner and a little white wooden picket fence surrounded them.

I have had two red convertibles and a silver one. A year ago I spotted my current convertible; it was glistening in the sun in all of its green metallic glory, with just two seats! There is a corner on my way home that reminds me of the neighbors, although it belongs to the bank. The flowers planted on the corner spill over the sidewalk, just like they did in my long ago memory. When the top is down I usually get a hearty dose of their summer fragrance and I resist the urge to step on the gas a little harder to spin me around the corner.