Shaun’s First Car

 

Shaun once had a red Toyota Celica 2nd Generation 2-door coupe which, to the best of my recollection was his first car. i can’t remember if he got it before or after we met, but at least he wasn’t walking 3 miles to school anymore. Speculation would put gas prices of the time at a mere 89 cents and since it was a Toyota, one imagines that it was easy to keep it gassed by simply grabbing a handful from the sea of change on the floor of the backseats. One generally had to stake out seating or footspace in that car because littered among “the sea” were books, clothes, food wrappings, take-out containers, cassette tapes, shoes, a skateboard – geez if there was anything in the trunk i can’t remember. I suppose we must have been places in that car but i can think of two instances in particular.

The first instance would be the jump on Westcliff. There was this rise in the pavement somewhere around Buffalo traveling east (it’s probably gone now) and one time, we thought it would be pretty fuckin’ cool to take the jump as fast as we could. The speed limit was 35 (which i remember now coz i got my first ticket on Westcliff just a month after getting my license (just why do they allow 16-year-olds to drive!?)) so, in order to try this feat, Shaun would have to break the speed limit. You have to admit, if there are no lives to endanger but your own, driving fast and taking jumps is fun as hell.  We got the idea because we had already passed the rise faster than intended and had felt a split-second of zero-G. This got us excited and would need a repeat and thus requiring the added moving violation of a u-turn in a non u-turn zone. So we’re on the second approach and i actually VOLUNTARILY don a seatbelt. I had my new guitar between my legs and i held on to it dearly as Shaun floored it and, in the next split-second, i swear we attained lift-off and then came crashing back down onto Westcliff Drive. Jumping cars is exhilarating and everyone should try it at least once (no don’t, trained professionals only! geez i’m a dad for chrissakes what am i saying?)

The second instance would be him driving me across town to leave some flowers or something (cheesy/sappy teenage boy hoping to get girl ploy) at Robbie’s house. We had to drive like a million miles to the SE corner of Las Vegas which meant freeway time. The thing i remember is that it was early December and cold and Shaun drove the whole way with his window down.  And that’s how he drove – be it day or night, excruciatingly hot or freezing – windows down.

We listened to alot of music at full volume in that car. Among the scattering of tapes was R.E.M., The Smiths, Led Zeppelin plus god knows what. I had just recently discovered the wonder of Athens and was happy to have my newest friend also be a Georgian. There is another instance – we collected change from the floor of the  Celica so we could buy They Might Be Giants Lincoln over at The Wherehouse.  It probably cost about $6.99 or something but it was worth it for Ana Ng alone – “i don’t want the world, i just want your half” – so Purple Toupee and Cage & Aquarium were just an added bonus.

i can’t recall how long he had this car, just that the next car was a white Subaru and the one after that was a blue? Camaro. Each had the same sea of debris albeit with changing tapes. For some reason i don’t remember much about these last two cars other than that Shaun had a funny assortment of vehicles before he even turned 19. He did drive us all sorts of places before i got a license and he never complained, though of course, teenagers do tend to be more generous with lifts and such. he’d drive anywhere, anytime.