It is 1963. I’m a football player in 11th grade. I’m in English Class at Maple Heights High School. I’m in the first row, third seat back nearest the window (A potential escape route if the building gets bombed, or more likely, if I say something stupid and bomb myself). In the first seat is our alternate quarterback Melvin Fenger. He plays offense, I play defense and smash the opposing quarterbacks. Melvin is at ease with the girls. Me, not so much! Honestly, not much at all… OK, never!! Behind him and in front of me is this cute little girl named Norma Velek. Oh yes, I like her all right. I could picture myself with her in my new (to me) 1950 Merc. I can recall this scene vividly in my mind as clearly as it was yesterday. However, at this stage in my life and social development, it is pure fantasy. She is unattainable to me. It’s not possible. The Merc, however, is reality
I am 16 and my grandfather has given me his thirteen year old 1950 Mercury. I am one of the few teens with their own car. That should be impressive to some girls. But no, a couple of my well-to-do classmates are driving new convertible Corvairs that their dads bought them; now that’s impressive. My Merc is the classic James Dean car of the movies fame. Truthfully however, I don’t even know who James Dean is. I’m sure grandpa didn’t either. Giving me the car was, in retrospect, Grandpa’s way of hooking me into old cars-automobiles, which were his life and livelihood. (He was a lifelong mechanic restorer for The Thompson Auto Museum, now the Crawford Auto museum). Grandpa and my father maintained at least a couple Model “A” Fords throughout the depression. But then the war came along and Dad came out of that as a crack machinist which he went on to excell as.
The Merc needed a good bit of help body-wise though it seemed to run well. It was also a gas hog, which mattered when your only income was cutting grass in the neighborhood. Early on when I was 14 my dad taught me how to do bodywork on our 1955 Mercury which was a second car that we used as a fishing car and occasionally the car which he drove to work when my mother needed the good car for the day. Obviously, cars were important status symbols for them. She did not like to be seen in what was considered a junker, and often it looked the part as various portions of it were covered in primer or missing while I worked on it. There were notable examples in the neighborhood that you had to clearly be held above. The guy across the street, Leroy Moser, was a mechanic of some kind and drove old junkers until they dropped and then resurrected them again and again until they were swept away with the trash. I’ll never forget his black and rust 1946 Chevrolet coupe that he drove. He had a son my age, Danny, and occasionally I got to ride in it. The rear fenders were literally wired on through the rust holes with utility wire. Nothing else held them to the car. They flapped in the wind as you drove. The inside always had that old damp upholstery smell. If you went over to his garage there was invariably whole transmissions lying on the workbench as if exploded apart.
Bodywork to Dad consisted of sanding the rusted area down to bare metal, then soldering a sheet metal patch and filling it in with a then new product called Bondo, sanding it, feathering the edges and painting it. Oh, it worked for a while until the rust eventually ate through the patch. But it was a start, and I did learn how to handle a spray gun and a grinder.
I fixed the body up on that James Dean Merc over the next year and easily sold it making a good profit with the aim of getting something easier on gas. No, not a Corvair; they were out of my league. I was thinking more of a 1955 Ford.
Meanwhile, I am the football team’s first string defensive tackle so I guess lots of people know or recognize me. I am oblivious to that though. I am basically quiet, rarely say much, and at 16 feel very awkward around girls. I’m a very late bloomer—possibly killed off by the frost. (I don’t think that I really had a date until I left home at 17 after graduation. OK, yes, I made up for lost ground upon going to college). Yes, I have an uncomfortable home life. Alcohol factors far too heavily in my childhood home –both Mom and Dad. I try to be away from home as much as I can now that I can drive.
So here I am, 16 years old, sitting right next to a dream girl that I really like, would love to get to know. She seems very easy to talk to, very comfortable to be around. Boy am I clumsy. “Norma, could I…” is about as far as I can get. Words fail me. I don’t have the slightest idea what to do or say to strike up a conversation. My only social group is sports. I could say something like,“Norma, go out for a long one.” No, that won’t work. My sister Lynn got into church groups. Me, I worked in the garage as much as possible. So, at 16, I have very little experience with girls and I am very quickly learning to be wary of any girl that has any of Mom’s characteristics. But I haven’t quite refined that wariness yet. That will take some practice. My first experience with asking a girl out was when I was a high school senior. There was this cute girl named Virginia Schutt that sat across from me in study hall. She was quite a looker, pistol, sharp, quick, cute. Probably a year younger than me, I could picture us going roller skating at a rink in Chagrin Falls or Geauga Lake. I’d pick her up in my Mercury. It took me many months to work up the courage to ask her, but when finally I did, she responded, “you’re asking me out??” Then she laughed it off. Oh, this is embarrassing, my worst nightmare and I’m not near an escape window to jump out of! Mommy Dearest was written all over her! Lesson in Wariness 101, -leave the sharp, quick, lookers alone! It was quite a while before I attempted anything like that again, and then it was with a girl that I met repeatedly in a series of summer social situations. That was my first girlfriend and by then I had a 1955 Ford Crown Victoria. I have pleasant memories.
So the task at hand is to tie this all together to the here and now. I am a widower and have a very amiable partner Kathy Hughes. We seem to meet each other’s needs. I have been crippled up by a spinal operation that has left me with not great use of my legs and balance problems. Judy Novak Hrko from Garrettsville, a master gardener, helps me out tremendously. I depend on her. Judy’s a talker and, like Kathy, is involved in a number of community social groups. Her neighbor Norma Copanic, who it turns out was, earlier in life, Norma Velek in Maple Heights said, “ I read all his columns and I wondered about his last name. Do you think that his real name was/is Roy?” “Indeed it is, but he doesn’t go by it”! Long story. Read between the lines.
I just got off the phone with Norma Copanic. She too is a talker! You might notice that I hook up with talkers–a vestigial holdover that somehow maybe makes up for what I once was not confident at. What a delightful conversation we had. I hope that soon we will be able to meet for coffee in the Garrettsville Coffee shop. I’ll be there, a 77 year old geezer driving my 93 year old 1930 Ford, to see a 60 years ago dream girl who now lives a hop, skip, and a jump away from me.
